Complaints about transgender athletes and gender ideology in other K12 activities are now the target of a new “Title IX Special Investigations Team” launched by the U.S. Departments of Education and Justice.
The Trump administration, along with its vows to shut down the Education Department, has turned the agency’s enforcement efforts towards what it considers discriminatory Title IX violations in women’s and girls’ athletics.
Following President Donald Trump’s executive order, Keeping Men out of Women’s Sports, ED is investigating several states and districts for allowing transgender athletes to participate in girls’ competitions or use girls’ locker rooms.
In launching the Title IX Special Investigations Team, Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said her agency is now tackling “a staggering volume of Title IX complaints.” The specialized team should resolve these reports rapidly, resulting in the “ultimate DOJ enforcement,” she added.
“To all the entities that continue to allow men to compete in women’s sports and use women’s intimate facilities: there’s a new sheriff in town,” McMahon said in a statement. “We will not allow you to get away with denying women’s civil rights any longer.”
Attorney General Pamela Bondi added that her department will “use the full power of the law to remedy any violation of women’s civil rights.”
The “Title IX Special Investigations Team” will comprise attorneys from the civil rights divisions of both departments. The team launched Friday, one day after the Trump administration threatened to withhold Title I funding over DEI programs.
K12 school districts must now certify their adherence to Title VI anti-discrimination policies or risk losing federal funding. State education agencies have 10 days to sign and return their certifications for each district.
American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten called the move an “attack on poor kids.”
“In the middle of a school year, the president is trying to bully the very same school districts that he insisted, just a few weeks ago, should be in charge of education,” Weingarten said. “He’s wielding a cudgel of billions in federal aid to tens of millions of children, of all races and ethnicities, to force educators to kowtow to his politics and ideology.
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