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Finding that Texas was likely to prevail in its lawsuit challenging the Biden administration’s new Title IX rule, a district judge has temporarily blocked the regulations from taking effect in the Lone Star State.
Thursday’s court order from the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas makes Texas the 15th state where the new Title IX regulations are on hold. Texas and other states have taken issue with provisions in the new rule that strengthen protections for LBGTQ+ students, which they claim will allow men and boys into women’s and girls’ bathrooms and locker rooms.
“The Final Rule inverts the text, history, and tradition of Title IX,” Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk wrote in a 32-page opinion accompanying the injunction. “The statute protects women in spaces historically reserved to men; the Final Rule inserts men into spaces reserved to women.”
The order also blocks other changes, including new protections for pregnant and parenting students. Texas officials have already instructed public colleges and K-12 schools in the state to not comply with the new rule, which is set to take effect Aug. 1.
Although the lawsuit makes a number of points argued in other lawsuits, the state and two University of Texas at Austin professors took issue with a provision they say will require plaintiffs to cover abortions in their student health insurance plans, as well as changes to how universities investigate reports of sexual misconduct. The new Title IX rule, they argued in the lawsuit, removes procedural safeguards for students accused of misconduct.
Kacsmaryk agreed with the plaintiffs that they would suffer irreparable injury if the regulations took effect in the state.
“In summary, the State of Texas and its political subdivisions are on a collision course with the Final Rule,” he wrote. “Texas can either (1) comply and violate State law, local policy, and many of its employees’ rights of conscience or (2) reject the Final Rule and lose billions in federal funding for its K–12 and higher-education systems.”
The Biden administration can appeal the order to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
