Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr has filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration's revised Title IX rule, which includes discrimination based on gender identity and sexual orientation and the participation of transgender athletes in women's sports.
Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr has taken legal action against the Biden administration's revised Title IX rule, which expands the definition of sex discrimination to include gender identity and sexual orientation. The rule also fails to prohibit schools from enacting bans on transgender athletes competing against biological females, a move that Carr believes undermines the integrity of women's sports.
"The Biden administration is destroying women's sports by gutting commonsense provisions that protect female athletes and demanding that biological males be allowed to compete against females," Carr said in a statement. "Today, we have taken action to defend women's rights to fair competition, and we will keep fighting until we end this absurdity once and for all."
The lawsuit filed by Carr lists Alabama, South Carolina, Florida, the Independent Women's Law Center, Independent Women's Network, Parents Defending Education, and Speech First, Inc. as co-plaintiffs.
The Biden administration's revision of Title IX redefines "sex" as "gender identity" and "sexual orientation," mandating that schools ensure students use "preferred pronouns" for their classmates. Non-compliance could result in the loss of federal funding.
Additionally, schools are prohibited from separating or treating individuals differently based on sex, allowing locker rooms and bathrooms to be based on gender identity.
"While different administrations can have different policy views, they cannot override the text that Congress enacted in 1972 or overrule the binding precedent of this circuit. The Biden rule does both—to the detriment of the States, their schools, and their students. For a host of reasons, this new rule violates the Administrative Procedure Act and should be set aside," the lawsuit argues.
Carr has previously expressed opposition to the Title IX revision, which was first introduced in July 2022. He urged the NCAA to protect women's sports by rescinding the rule permitting biological males to participate in women's athletics.
Similarly, Carr has provided legal support for Arizona and West Virginia's "Save Women's Sports Act."
Texas Governor Greg Abbott has also condemned the Biden administration's revision, directing the Texas Education Agency to disregard the "illegal dictate."
"Congress wrote Title IX to protect women," Abbott wrote in a letter addressed to Biden. "Biden, with no authority to do so, rewrote Title IX to protect men who identify as women. This tramples Texas laws that prohibit men in women's sports."
The Biden administration's revision has faced criticism from various perspectives, including Riley Gaines, host of the "Gaines for Girls" podcast on OutKick.
"The president and his administration cannot claim to care about women or our opportunities and then go and wipe out women's protections under the country's landmark sex equality law," Gaines said.
"Title IX was passed over fifty years ago to end unjust discrimination in education, including athletics. I experienced this law [being] undermined when female athletes like myself were told to keep quiet when a male swimmer took home a title in the women's division and deprived female athletes of awards, honors, and the opportunity to compete."
The Independent Women's Forum also denounced the rule, stating, "This new rule turns Title IX on its head through extra-statutory regulations that require schools to allow males to self-identify into women's spaces, opportunities, and athletics."
The Biden administration's Title IX revision has generated significant backlash from states, organizations, and individuals who believe it undermines the rights of women and girls in sports and education. The outcome of the lawsuit filed by Carr and his co-plaintiffs remains to be seen, but it is clear that the debate over the rule's implications is far from over.
