AP
Radical changes to Title IX, the landmark federal civil rights law that prohibits discrimination against girls and women in school sports, are set to take effect across the country on Aug. 1.
Thanks, Joe Biden!
But the US Department of Education can’t enforce its controversial new revisions in schools where at least one parent belongs to the 130,000-member Moms for Liberty advocacy group, a federal judge has ruled — including some right here in New York City.
Passed in 1972, Title IX prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex and guarantees girls equal sports opportunities with boys at federally funded educational institutions from elementary school through college.
Yet the coming changes championed by the Biden administration will grant federal protection to boys who want to compete in girls’ sports or access girls’ locker rooms or showers based on their “gender identity” — and will also make “misgendering” a fellow student a civil rights violation.
But, due to an injunction from a Kansas judge, thousands of schools across the nation will be exempt — and all a parent has to do is join Moms for Liberty before July 15.
Did I mention that membership is free and you can sign up online?
This is great news for parents who want fairness for their athlete-daughters, and for those who want their kids to be able to speak the truth about who is male and who is female without getting in trouble at school.
It’s good news, too, for parents who worry about their kids making a mistake and getting hounded for a federal civil rights offense — after all, genders can change fast among the teens of today.
The Supreme Court case Loper Bright v. Raimondo, decided in June, overruled a 40-year rule known as “Chevron deference” that directed judges to defer to administrative interpretations of ambiguities in the law.
The Kansas judge who ruled in favor of Moms for Liberty wasted no time in citing the brand new precedent.
On July 2, Judge John Broomes of the District of Kansas granted an injunction that stops the implementation of the new Title IX changes for all plaintiffs in the case, including members of three national organizations.
In other words, because of the Supreme Court ruling, the Kansas judge did not have to defer to the US Department of Education when the feds tried to “clarify” that the term “sex” in the text of Title IX actually means “gender identity.”
Good thing, too: As the judge pointed out, the department couldn’t even define “gender identity.”
But anyone who has seen a girl standing to the side of the winner’s podium while a boy got her medal knows what it means: cheating.
Broomes also found that the government’s new rules likely violate the First Amendment.
He explained that neither he nor any of the lawyers in the courtroom could “offer any possible explanation of what a parent should tell their child about the limits of legal speech at their schools on the topic of gender identity or sexual orientation” under the new Title IX rules.
“The result is that speech is chilled because what student wants to run the risk of being accused of sex-based harassment and subjected to an investigation and potential discipline,” he wrote.
Due to state regulations, New York City kids must still navigate the social, legal and educational minefields of gender identity in our schools.
Our State Education Department has adopted official guidance that calls for almost everything the US Department of Education is now enjoined from doing.
But at least students in schools with Moms for Liberty parents can’t be threatened with federal civil rights violations for defying the new rules — and schools that comply with Broomes’ decision can’t lose federal funding for doing so.
Yet it’s deeply unfair — not to mention unconstitutional — that New York students can’t earnestly say, “Hey, I want to talk about what the gender identity rules mean for girls’ sports.”
Nor can they truthfully say, “I don’t think humans can change their sex” without risking accusations of discrimination and school discipline.
It’s certainly “speech-chilling” to face such consequences, as Broomes determined.
And I know: After passing a non-binding resolution seeking to review New York City’s 2019 guidelines allowing boys to play girls’ sports in city schools, the chancellor removed me from my elected Community Education Council seat — and 18 local politicians wrote a public letter calling my request “hateful and discriminatory.”
It’s neither.
Parents everywhere should demand that Title IX, a law passed to prohibit discrimination against girls in sports, is not rewritten to allow boys to take records, medals, scholarships and opportunities away from girls.
Students who identify as trans or non-binary should certainly be welcome and encouraged to play sports in school, and they can right now — on teams that align with their biological sex.
That’s basic fairness — and a majority of Americans across both parties agree.
Maud Maron is an NYC public school parent and president of the consulting firm ThirdRail.