Female athletes and their families are gearing up for legal battles as high school athletic associations in California and Minnesota face a federal investigation for refusing to implement President Donald Trump’s recent executive order banning men from women’s sports.
The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights announced investigations Wednesday into the Minnesota State High School League and the California Interscholastic Federation, both of which announced they would abide by state law rather than federal Title IX law and continue allowing male athletes to compete in girls sports and use girls’ private spaces.
“The Minnesota State High School League and the California Interscholastic Federation are free to engage in all the meaningless virtue-signaling that they want, but at the end of the day, they must abide by federal law,” acting Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Craig Trainor said in a public statement. “OCR’s [Office for Civil Rights’] Chicago and San Francisco regional offices will conduct directed investigations into both organizations to ensure that female athletes in these states are treated with the dignity, respect, and equality that the Trump Administration demands.”
Both organizations have yet to change their bylaws to accommodate Trump’s recent executive order, “Keeping Men out of Women’s Sports.” The order, signed Feb. 5, directs federal agencies to ensure that entities that receive federal funding interpret Title IX law according to biological sex, not the sex someone chooses to “identify” as.
Republican Majority Whip Tom Emmer, who has been outspoken on the issue of protecting women’s sports, said his home state of Minnesota should implement the president’s executive order.
“Keeping biological men out of women’s sports isn’t a Republican or Democrat issue; it’s a commonsense issue,” Emmer told The Daily Signal. “It’s past time for Tim Walz and the DFL [Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party] to focus less on turning Minnesota into California and more on protecting the hardworking female athletes in our state.”
The federal funding allocated through Title IX is made possible without regard to state law, according to Center for American Freedom Executive Director and General Counsel Mark Trammell.
“At the end of the day, if they discover that these states are violating Title IX and have no intention of abiding by Title IX, then the federal government’s recourse is to strip these states of their federal funding,” Trammell told The Daily Signal.
Fox News reported the Minnesota State High School League would continue allowing “transgender” athletes to compete on girls’ teams despite the directive of the executive order. But the governing body said in a statement on Monday that it had made no official statement to this effect.
“Instead, the MSHSL [Minnesota State High School League] is seeking guidance to better understand how to proceed in the future,” the league said in a statement on its website.
The league said its current bylaw remains in place, allowing transgender student participation as it seeks guidance from Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison’s office on how to reconcile Trump’s executive order with the Minnesota Human Rights Act and the equal protection clause of the Minnesota Constitution, which prohibit discrimination against any person in a “protected class,” including “sexual orientation” and “gender identity.”
Ellison’s office declined a request for comment from The Daily Signal.
The league announced on its website Wednesday it intends to fully cooperate with the Office for Civil Rights’ investigation.
Meanwhile, the governing body for high school athletics in California said it will continue to allow biological males to compete against girls.
“The CIF [California Interscholastic Federation] provides students with the opportunity to belong, connect, and compete in education-based experiences in compliance with California law (Education Code section 221.5. (f)), which permits students to participate in school programs and activities, including athletic teams and competitions, consistent with the student’s gender identity, irrespective of the gender listed on the student’s records,” the federation said in a statement shared with The Daily Signal.
As the main governing body for sports in the state of California, the federation says it is tasked with ensuring its schools comply with Title IX.
“By failing to recognize both the executive order and Title IX, they are misleading school districts, which could result in the school districts losing their federal funding,” Sophia Lorey, the outreach director for the nonprofit organization California Family Council, told The Daily Signal.
The fight for enforcing Title IX in the state is nowhere near over, Lorey said.
“With Democrats having a supermajority in Sacramento, we will most likely have to see AB 1266 found as a violation of Title IX in the courts in order to see protection for female sports in California,” Lorey said.
State law AB 1266 allows students to play sports and go into private spaces like locker rooms based on the gender they identify as rather than biological sex. The law is being challenged by Advocates for Faith & Freedom, a legal organization representing two female high school athletes from California.
Legal counsel for Advocates for Faith & Freedom Julianne Fleischer said she anticipates schools in the state will lose funding because federal law preempts state law.
“It’s really doing a disservice to all students when the state is choosing to double down on an issue that is not supported by federal law,” Fleischer said.
The issue will drag out in the courts in both states, according to Trammell.
“Let’s be honest, this is just infantile virtue signaling—people like Tim Walz who are thirsting for another headline,” Trammell said. “It’s not that they’re actually trying to protect women’s sports. It’s a headline for Tim Walz.”
Walz’s office did not respond to a request for comment from The Daily Signal.
This article was originally published at www.dailysignal.com
