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Following an order to address “a staggering volume of Title IX complaints,” the Education and Justice Departments are creating a special investigations team, the agencies announced Friday.
The new team will allow the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights to more rapidly resolve investigations and ensure that cases are “fully prepared for ultimate DOJ enforcement.” The special investigations team will include OCR investigators and attorneys as well as attorneys from the Justice Department’s civil right division and the Education Department’s general counsel’s office, according to the release.
“From day one, the Trump Administration has prioritized enforcing Title IX to protect female students and athletes,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon said in a statement. “Traditionally, our Office for Civil Rights takes months, even years, to complete Title IX investigations. OCR under this Administration has moved faster than it ever has, and the Title IX SIT will ensure even more rapid and consistent investigations.”
By the end of Friday, the investigative team had announced a directed investigation into the California Department of Education “for their alleged failure to protect women’s sports,” McMahon said on social media.
Title IX investigations can encompass a range of issues from campus sexual misconduct to complaints that programs focused on women discriminate against men to athletics. In her statement and video posted on social media, McMahon focused on allegations involving trans women.
“We have received a staggering number of complaints about men competing in women's sports and invading women-only intimate spaces,” McMahon said in the video. “To all entities receiving federal funding who continue to allow these illegal practices, we will not permit you to trample on women’s rights any longer.”
OCR has long struggled to clear a backlog in cases. The office received 22,687 complaints in fiscal year 2024, and a little over half concerned sex discrimination, according to OCR’s annual report. McMahon recently laid off half of OCR’s employees—a move that former staffers in OCR say could make it more difficult for the department to enforce civil rights laws.
