AG Rokita tells Indiana schools to ignore Title IX update
5/30/24
Indiana schools have been advised to ignore a recent change made by the Biden administration to Title IX, a nondiscrimination mandate meant to protect women from sex-based discrimination and harassment in sports and academia.
Title IX was established in 1972 to hold educational institutions accountable and provide legal protections for women who have experienced different forms of discrimination, such as: “sex-based harassment; sexual violence; pregnancy discrimination; the failure to provide equal athletic opportunity; sex-based discrimination in a school’s science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) courses and programs; discriminatory application of dress code policies and/or enforcement; and retaliation.”
The Biden administration used this important statute meant to protect women to redefine “sex” in federal law – the implications of which are vast and concerning. In the Title IX update, the Department of Education took the liberty of interpreting “sex” to mean “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” rather than biological reality. The term “gender identity” was inserted into the statute more than 280 times.
Because of this alteration, men who say they are women can now claim the Title IX protections that have been in place for decades to protect women and girls from the very real threat of discrimination and harassment in historically male-dominated spaces such as sports and academia. Thanks to the increasingly woke agenda in the education system, Title IX is needed now more than ever to protect women who have been disadvantaged by men pretending to be women.
“Congress intended Title IX to prevent discrimination against girls and women,” Attorney General Todd Rokita said. “The point was to encourage increased participation by girls and women in middle school, high school and college athletics. Now leftists are trying to twist Title IX to codify the very kind of anti-woman prejudice and discrimination this law was originally intended to remedy.” (emphasis added)
Here at IFI, we are committed to protecting girls and women in sports and pushing back against federal overreach. We’re thankful to have an attorney general who shares those same values and isn’t afraid to fight back against the Department of Education’s illegitimate Title IX rewrite. We know their unlawful override of this important statute will not stand in court.