Two Oklahoma elected officials challenge federal government over proposed gender rules

Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond and the Oklahoma State Department of Education – led by state schools Superintendent Ryan Walters – filed separate lawsuits Monday against U.S. Education Secretary Miguel Cardona and the U.S. Department of Education concerning a new Title IX rule interpretation announced by the federal agency last month.

Last week, Drummond threatened a lawsuit over the new rule – known as the “Final Rule” – and Walters hinted after the most recent state Board of Education meeting that he was also considering a lawsuit. The day before the meeting, he sent a letter to Oklahoma school districts telling them they shouldn’t obey the new rule.

Both lawsuits were filed in U.S. District Court in Oklahoma City. Both allege the addition of gender identity as a protected class, made by Cardona and the federal agency, is unconstitutional and ignores the language within Title IX, a law passed in 1972 that prohibits sex-based discrimination in any educational program that receives financial assistant from the federal government.

“In doing so … it ignores the literal text of the statute and the purpose behind the creation, it disregards the lack of public support for the proposed rule, and it jeopardizes the equal opportunity that has been afforded to female athletes ever since the establishment of the statute,” Drummond’s filing said.

“The Department attempts to make these drastic and detrimental changes while relying on a Supreme Court case that has no connection to Title IX. Perhaps worst of all, implementation of the Final Rule would serve to isolate and deny the group of athletes that the statute was originally designed to promote and protect – female athletes.”

U.S. education secretary touted new rules as empowering

Cardona announced the new Title IX rule interpretation on April 19. In response to a request for comment on Monday, a U.S. Department of Education spokesperson said the department does not comment on pending litigation.

“The Department crafted the final Title IX regulations following a rigorous process to give complete effect to the Title IX statutory guarantee that no person experiences sex discrimination in federally funded education,” the spokesperson said. “As a condition of receiving federal funds, all federally funded schools are obligated to comply with these final regulations and we look forward to working with school communities all across the country to ensure the Title IX guarantee of nondiscrimination in school is every student’s experience.”

In announcing the new rule last month, Cardona lauded it as promoting educational equity and opportunity for students, along with accountability and fairness. He said the new rule would empower and support students and families.

“For more than 50 years, Title IX has promised an equal opportunity to learn and thrive in our nation's schools free from sex discrimination,” Cardona said. “These final regulations build on the legacy of Title IX by clarifying that all our nation’s students can access schools that are safe, welcoming, and respect their rights.”

Both lawsuits also claim the new rules would harm, and not help, female students.

“Students of both sexes will experience violations of their bodily privacy by students of a different sex,” Drummond’s lawsuit said. “Indeed, the Final Rule also ignores psychological and safety concerns. For instance, a recent study points out that ‘limited research has explored girls’ experiences of competing on boys’ sports teams,’ noting unique challenges to female athletes. … Female athletes describe ‘having to navigate tensions and problematic assumptions of girls’ inferiority in sport.’ Meanwhile, research shows that female athletes are more willing to participate in single-sex athletics and less likely to feel self-conscious in single-sex athletics.”

Drummond’s lawsuit asks for a stay of the effective date of the rules, which are now set to take effect Aug. 1, and for a preliminary injunction preventing the federal agency from enforcing the rules. It also asks the court to declare the new rules to be unlawful, arbitrary and capricious, to allow Oklahoma to continue to receive Title IX funding, “notwithstanding any failure to adhere to the Final Rule’s unlawful requirements,” and to vacate the new rules.

What does the state Department of Education's lawsuit claim?

The state Department of Education said in a news release that its lawsuit is “the first and only independent legal action taken by any state education agency challenging the sweeping revisions to Title IX,” although that claim couldn’t immediately be independently confirmed.

Walters said in a statement the new rules have “set back the cause of civil rights for women by generations. I will do everything possible to protect the essential and fundamental right of women and girls to have safe spaces of their own to compete, change clothes, and use the bathroom."

He added: “Women and girls deserve better than to have their futures put in jeopardy by Joe Biden and the out-of-touch leftist bureaucrats that permeate Washington, D.C. I am proud that we are filing this critically important lawsuit to protect the prerogative of states to find policies that meet the needs of their citizens.”

The state Department of Education lawsuit also names two other federal officials as defendants – Catherine Lhamon, the federal Department of Education’s assistant secretary for civil rights, and Randolph Wills, the federal agency’s deputy assistant secretary for enforcement.

The lawsuit requests the court to stop enforcement of Title IX “as barring discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.” It also asks for the court to declare the federal Department of Education has acted unconstitutionally, arbitrarily and capriciously in enacting the new rule.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Separate federal lawsuits on Title IX rule filed by Drummond, Walters