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The Department of Education‘s newly announced regulations governing the implementation of Title IX were met with widespread derision by conservative activists and Republican politicians.
On Thursday, the department released a new regulatory proposal on Title IX that would substantially overhaul the rule implemented by Trump Education Secretary Betsy DeVos that was notable for its expansion of due process protections for campus sexual assault adjudications.
The new regulation rolls back most of the due process requirements implemented by the department under DeVos’s leadership. It also expands Title IX protections against discrimination on the basis of sex to include gender identity and sexual orientation.
After the proposal was released, Republican lawmakers and conservative activists wasted no time in denouncing the changes.
EDUCATION DEPARTMENT ROLLS BACK DEVOS-ERA TITLE IX REGULATION
Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-NC), the ranking member of the House Committee on Education and Labor, ripped the proposed rule as an “unabashed embrace of bomb-throwing activism.”
“Today’s proposed Title IX regulations are nothing more than a conduit for the Left’s woke agenda that will demolish due process rights and the safety of young women and girls across the country, with promised regulations still to come to undermine women’s access to athletic opportunities,” Foxx said. “For an administration that claims to carry the torch for ‘equality’, these proposed regulations are steeped in hypocrisy. Policies such as these serve one purpose, and one purpose only: to tilt the scales in favor of radical partisans.”
Foxx’s comments were echoed by Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC), the ranking member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, who released a statement saying the new regulation “threatens students’ Constitutional right to due process and the core American value of justice for all.”
“Instead of upholding the key tenets of our judicial system, the Department of Education’s proposal returns to the deeply flawed campus disciplinary process of the Obama administration, which led to hundreds of inconsistent judgments and more than 300 legal challenges,” Burr said. “The existing rule struck a balance that follows the law and is fair to both parties. This attempted overreach is not only extremely concerning but runs counter to federal court precedent and the opinions of leading legal experts, including the late Justice Ginsburg. With this proposed regulatory change, it’s clear the administration is placing accusations of guilt above fair consideration of the evidence.”
While Burr’s comments primarily focused on the rollback of due process protections, which includes the elimination of a live hearing with cross-examination of both involved parties for sexual assault cases, a number of conservative groups and leaders expressed alarm at the expanded definition of “sex.”
“A shift from biological sex to gender identity means that girls and women will be forced to accept the presence of biological males in what have always been single-sex spaces,” Erika Sanzi, the director of outreach for the parent activist group Parents Defending Education, said of the newly proposed rule. “It means that female students will be forced to use the same restroom as biologically male classmates and staff members, who identify as girls and women, and will likely be forced to compete in the same athletic events. Dignity and respect matter for everyone, but so do fairness and safety, and these proposed changes represent a total rejection of fairness and safety in the name of ideology.”
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Kevin Roberts, the president of the conservative Heritage Foundation and the former president of Wyoming Catholic College, said the new regulation was “one more reason why we need to abolish the Department of Education.”
“Thanks to unelected bureaucrats, male students who merely ‘identify’ as female will have a ‘right’ to access female dorms, bathrooms, lockers, and showers. This rejection of obvious differences between men and women, boys and girls, will rob young people across this country of their innocence,” Roberts said. “Absurdities like this are why I rejected federal funding as president of Wyoming Catholic College during the Obama administration.”
