The College Fix

The blows to President Joe Biden’s reinterpretation of Title IX to include gender identity keep coming fast and furious.

Under a Republican majority, the House of Representatives on Thursday approved a joint resolution to block the Education Department’s three-month-old pro-transgender revise of Title IX that adds gender identity as a protected class.

The rewrite, supposed to take effect Aug. 1, would allow female-identifying men into women’s locker rooms and bathrooms and require others to address them with their preferred pronouns.

The House vote came on the same day a judge in Texas approved an injunction against the new rule, becoming the fourth judge to do so over the last month.

While proponents of the revise argue it simply expands basic protections granted under Title IX, Judge Reed O’Connor of the Northern District of Texas sided with a public school district arguing it will cause harm.

The Biden rule “undermines over fifty years of progress for women and girls made possible by Title IX. Worse still, the Final Rule endangers not only women and girls, but all students,” O’Connor wrote in his 15-page ruling. “Just like the subjective nature of ever-changing gender identity, the Department of Education picks and chooses which ‘niche’ group to prioritize regardless of the consequences for everyone else and regardless of its authority.”

“Functionally displacing Title IX’s understanding of ‘sex’ while refusing to define it, the Department of Education’s Final Rule has ‘no basis in reality.’ This cannot be.”

At this point, combining all four judges who have granted the temporary injunction — which includes one ruling that effectively bans it nationwide because it pertains to group-membership in 50 states — the Biden rule’s  Aug. 1 implementation appears precarious.

As for the House resolution, it passed along party lines, 210 to 205, the Washington Stand reported, adding it “now goes to the Democrat-controlled Senate, where it faces a dubious fate. Should it pass the Democrat-controlled body, President Biden would likely veto it.”

The resolution states “Congress disapproves the rule submitted by the Department of Education relating to ‘Nondiscrimination on the Basis of Sex in Education Programs or Activities Receiving Federal Financial Assistance’ (89 Fed. Reg. 33474; published April 29, 2024), and such rule shall have no force or effect.”

Prior to the vote, Democrats argued conservative are overhyping the dangers the new rule presents and accused them of discrimination. But Republicans championed their side.

“By adding ‘gender identity’ to Title IX’s protected classes, the radical left and the Biden administration will tear down women’s sports and eliminate safe and private spaces for girls,” said Rep. Virginia Foxx, the North Carolina Republican who chairs the House education committee, in remarks on the House floor, as reported by Inside Higher Ed. “The rule puts a man’s perceived feelings of femininity on par with actual womanhood rooted in biological sex.”

The Independent Women’s Forum applauded the GOP for its leadership in a statement posted on its website.

“Today, we saw clearly who stands with women, and who doesn’t,” stated Carrie Lukas, the group’s president. “Title IX is a law that has been essential for women’s flourishing. Now, the Biden administration is pushing women aside to make way for any man willing to say he is a woman. It is shameful and it is wrong. Anyone who cares about women’s rights — and plain old common sense — should take notice.”

MORE: Third federal judge rules to block Biden’s Title IX revise adding gender identity

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