The U.S. Department of Education has launched Title IX investigations into two athlete associations located in California and Minnesota, after they said they would ignoring President Donald Trump‘s executive order banning transgender men out of women’s sports.
According to Fox News, the Minnesota High School League and the California Interscholastic Federation have both announced they will be continuing to allow transgender athletes to compete against biological females, despite being prohibited from doing so.
Acting assistant secretary for civil rights, Craig Trainor said both schools are “free to engage” in “virtue-signaling” but pointed out they must abide by federal law.
“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,” Trainor said.
“(The Office of 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,” Trainor added. “I would remind these organizations that history does not look kindly on entities and states that actively opposed the enforcement of federal civil rights laws that protect women and girls from discrimination and harassment.”
The executive order signed by Trump on National Girls and Women in Sports Day, celebrates female athletes and those committed to providing equal access to sports for females.
“In recent years, many educational institutions and athletic associations have allowed men to compete in women’s sports. This is demeaning, unfair, and dangerous to women and girls, and denies women and girls the equal opportunity to participate and excel in competitive sports,” the executive order reads.
It continues, “Moreover, under Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972 (Title IX), educational institutions receiving Federal funds cannot deny women an equal opportunity to participate in sports. As some Federal courts have recognized, ‘ignoring fundamental biological truths between the two sexes deprives women and girls of meaningful access to educational facilities.'”
The order goes on to state all funds would be rescinded from educational programs who “deprive women and girls of fair athletic opportunities”:
“Therefore, it is the policy of the United States to rescind all funds from educational programs that deprive women and girls of fair athletic opportunities, which results in the endangerment, humiliation, and silencing of women and girls and deprives them of privacy. It shall also be the policy of the United States to oppose male competitive participation in women’s sports more broadly, as a matter of safety, fairness, dignity, and truth.”
Fox News further reported that the United Nations had released a study that said over 900 female athletes had lost medal placings because of the inclusion of males in their sports.
