TEXAS — On the same day that Texas sued the Biden administration over its expansion of the gender equity law known as Title IX, Gov. Greg Abbott said the state will ignore it.

What You Need To Know

  • In a letter to President Joe Biden, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said he has instructed the Texas Education Agency to ignore the Biden administration's expansion of the gender equity law known as Title IX

  • The Biden administration last week detailed changes to Title IX that add protections for transgender, LGBTQ+ and pregnant students to federal civil rights law on sex-based discrimination

  • Abbott said that Biden has "rewritten Title IX to force schools to treat boys as if they are girls and to accept every student’s self-declared gender identity"

  • Texas filed a lawsuit to stop the expansion. It is one of five Republican-led states to do so

The Biden administration last week detailed changes to Title IX that add protections for transgender, LGBTQ+ and pregnant students to federal civil rights law on sex-based discrimination. Those changes will take effect in August.

Also set to change is a Trump-era guidance on how schools should handle cases of sexual assault.

Specifically, according to a Department of Education fact sheet, the update prohibits discrimination “based on sexual orientation, gender identity, and sex characteristics in federally funded education programs.” That includes protections for transgender students.

Abbott on Monday wrote on X, the social media platform previously known as Twitter, that he sent a letter to President Joe Biden “condemning his illegal rewrite of Title IX.”

“Title IX was written by Congress to support the advancement of women academically and athletically,” Abbott wrote in the letter. “The law was based on the fundamental premise that there are only two sexes — male and female. You have rewritten Title IX to force schools to treat boys as if they are girls and to accept every student’s self-declared gender identity. This ham-handed effort to impose a leftist belief onto Title IX exceeds your authority as President.”

Abbott continued, saying Texas has no intention of observing the changes.

“I am instructing the Texas Education Agency to ignore your illegal dictate. Your rewrite of Title IX not only exceeds your constitutional authority, but it also tramples laws that I signed to protect the integrity of women’s sports by prohibiting men from competing against female athletes.”

Texas is one of five Republican-led states that have sued Biden over the expanded protections.

The 1,577-page regulation finalized last week seeks to clarify Title IX, the 1972 sex discrimination law originally passed to address women’s rights.

At least 11 states have adopted laws barring transgender girls and women from using girls’ and women’s bathrooms at public schools.

The new regulation opposes those sweeping policies.

It states that sex separation at schools isn’t always unlawful. However, the separation becomes a violation of Title IX’s nondiscrimination rule when it causes more than a very minor harm on a protected individual, “such as when it denies a transgender student access to a sex-separate facility or activity consistent with that student’s gender identity.”