Supreme Court temporarily blocks Biden administration's new Title IX rule

The Supreme Court Aug. 16 declined to allow the Biden administration to enforce portions of a new regulation expanding Title IX protections from sex discrimination to include students who identify as transgender while legal challenges to the rule proceed.

In April, the Department of Education released its finalized regulation under Title IX, the 1972 federal civil rights law requiring that women and girls have equal access and treatment in education and athletics.

Department spokespersons argued the new regulation, originally scheduled to take effect Aug. 1, will ensure that at educational institutions that receive federal funding, no person experiences discrimination on the basis of sex — which it defined as sex stereotypes, sexual orientation, gender identity and sex characteristics — including sex-based harassment or sexual violence at such institutions.

But that regulation was challenged by several states, which argued that broadening the scope of the law could dilute its intended purpose of protecting women's athletics.

In its unsigned opinion, the Supreme Court found that all of the justices agreed the disputed changes could remain blocked.

"(A)ll Members of the Court today accept that the plaintiffs were entitled to preliminary injunctive relief as to three provisions of the rule, including the central provision that newly defines sex discrimination to include discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity," the high court said.

While four of the nine justices would have favored allowing undisputed portions of the regulation to take effect, the majority declined to do so, siding with the lower courts' view that "the allegedly unlawful provisions are not readily severable from the remaining provisions."

Jonathan Scruggs, who is Alliance Defending Freedom’s senior counsel and its vice president of litigation strategy and the Center for Conscience Initiatives, said in a statement, "The Biden-Harris administration's radical redefinition of sex turns back the clock on equal opportunity for women, undermines fairness, and threatens student safety and privacy."

"The Supreme Court rightly affirmed the 5th and 6th Circuit decisions to restrain the administration's illegal efforts to rewrite Title IX while these critical lawsuits continue," Scruggs said. "This administration is ignoring biological reality, science, and common sense. Female athletes, students, and teachers across the country are right to stand against the administration's adoption of extreme gender ideology, which would have devastating consequences for students, teachers, administrators, and families."

But administration officials argued the regulation is necessary to prevent all forms of sex-based discrimination against students.