Late Sunday, U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor said the administration has “drawn a line in the sand” on the issue, by threatening to withhold funding to schools that fail to comply with its guidelines, POLITICO reported.
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“The resolution of this hard policy issue is not, however, the subject of this Order”. The injunction against the Department of Education’s mandate will only increase the likelihood of at least one major transgender case being heard by Justice Antonin Scalia’s replacement at the nation’s highest court.
The decision comes on the heels of a U.S.
On Aug. 22, a federal court in Texas put Obama’s plan on hold, blocking federal officials from enforcing the directive until the lawsuits are settled in court, reports The Associated Press.
“Those states who do not want to be covered by this injunction can easily avoid doing so by state law”, the judge added. And together, Republican Texas leaders turned the feds’ attempt to provide a fair, comfortable and discrimination-free environment for transgender students at school into a fight over protecting non-transgender students’ privacy and safety.
About a dozen states sued the federal government in response, arguing that the plan turns schools “into laboratories for a massive social experiment”, reports NPR. “That can not be allowed to continue, which is why we took action to protect States and School Districts, who are charged under state law to establish a safe and disciplined environment conducive to student learning”.
The injunction does not prohibit schools from allowing transgender students to use bathrooms consistent with their gender identity, but those that don’t will not have to conform. The states argued that the Obama administration once again overstepped its constitutional bounds – this time with a flimsy application of Title IX. In June, the Kansas State Board of Education voted to ignore the order.
The U.S. Department of Education published guidelines in May instructing schools to not discriminate on the basis of gender identity. Alternately, individual bathrooms can be made available to all students. “We want to make sure all our students are safe and secure”. The guidance follows similar policies in states and school districts across the country, including many that have been treating transgender students with dignity and respect for more than a decade. The proposed accommodations would be similar to those of Bellevue Public Schools.
At the University of Missouri and at University of Missouri-Kansas City, officials said the ruling won’t change anything on their campuses.
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Civil rights organizations that had submitted a joint friend-of-the-court brief called the ruling a “misguided decision” that leaves transgender students vulnerable to harassment, stigma and abuse.
