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The U.S. Department of Education ramped up its campaign against schools defying Title IX and President Donald Trump’s executive order on Friday.
Secretary Linda McMahon announced actions against the states of Oregon and Virginia for their policies on gender ideology.
In Oregon, McMahon is launching an investigation against the state’s Department of Education (ODE) after a high school sports season that featured multiple incidents involving trans athletes in girls’ sports that garnered public attention, and two lawsuits over the matter.
“If Oregon is permitting males to compete in women’s sports, it is allowing these males to steal the accolades and opportunities that female competitors have rightfully earned through hard work and grit, while callously disregarding women’s and girls’ safety, dignity, and privacy. Title IX does not permit that shameful arrangement, and we will not tolerate it,” said Craig Trainor, the acting assistant secretary for the DOE’s office of civil rights (OCR).
On Thursday, Oregon girls’ track athletes Alexa Anderson and Reese Eckard filed a lawsuit against the Oregon School Athletics Association (OSAA) after an incident at the state’s track and field championships on the last day of May. Anderson and Eckard alleged that the OSAA not only excluded them from official photos, but also withheld their medals. The suit argues that the girls’ First Amendment rights were infringed upon by the officials.
Earlier in July, two other female students, Maddie Eischen and Sophia Carpenter, filed a lawsuit against the ODE and OSAA for its policies that allow males to compete in girls’ sports after an incident where they withdrew themselves from a track meet in April, because a male was set to compete against them.
TRACKING THE TRANS ATHLETE HIGH SCHOOL SPORTS CONTROVERSIES SHAKING THE NATION OVER THE LAST YEAR
Both Carpenter and Eischen previously told Fox News Digital the experience was “traumatic.”
“My experience at the Chehalem track meet and scratching myself from the meet was traumatic, something I never imagined ever having to do,” Eischen said.
Carpenter added, “It was emotionally traumatic trying to know what I should do and how I should respond to competing with [the trans athlete].”
The U.S. DOE investigation directly cites the lawsuits and the firm representing the athletes, the America First Policy Institute.
Fox News Digital has reached out to the ODE for a response.
Meanwhile, Friday also saw the DOE OCR announce an update on its investigation against five school districts in Virginia for “allegations of discrimination on the basis of sex.”
The OCR concluded its investigation and determined that the five school districts had violated Title IX. The investigation was based on complaints alleging that the Divisions have similar anti-discrimination policies pertaining to “transgender-identifying” students, which violate the sex-based protections of Title IX.
“Although this type of behavior was tolerated by the previous Administration, it’s time for Northern Virginia’s experiment with radical gender ideology and unlawful discrimination to come to an end. OCR’s investigation definitively shows that these five Virginia school districts have been trampling on the rights of students in the service of an extreme political ideology,” Trainor said.
“The Trump Administration will not sacrifice the safety, dignity, and innocence of America’s young women and girls at the altar of an anti-scientific illiberalism.”
The five school districts now have 10 days to come to a voluntary agreement with the Trump administration or risk a referral to the U.S. Department of Justice.
The DOJ has already launched lawsuits against officials in Maine and California for those states’ policies that allow trans athletes in girls’ and women’s sports.
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