Sacramento City Unified and La Mesa-Spring Valley school districts and Taft College in California are among six educational institutions in the U.S. that had civil rights settlements terminated by the U.S. Department of Education on Monday, according to the 

The agreements, negotiated by previous administrations, were meant to uphold protections for transgender students. Now that they have been terminated, the colleges and school districts are no longer obligated to continue measures such as faculty training or allowing students to use the bathrooms, names or pronouns that align with their gender identity, the Associated Press reported.

The termination of the agreements is an effort to enforce President Donald Trump’s executive order that the government recognize only a person’s sex assigned at birth. 

In Sacramento City Unified, that means the district will no longer have to abide by a 2024 settlement that requires it to provide training on Title IX policies to school administrators, teachers guidance counselors and school resource officers, according to the  

The settlement stems from a 2022 complaint by a transgender student who said a teacher refused to use his preferred pronouns and that an administrator also referred to him incorrectly. The Office for Civil Rights, under the Biden administration, agreed with the student and directed the school district to take corrective measures, according to The Bee.

Sacramento City Unified said Monday it “remains committed to the support of our LGBTQ+ students and staff.”

The district won’t decide whether to rescind the policies until it learns whether it will impact its federal funding, according to The Bee. The district faces a $170 million budget deficit and threats of state takeover.

La Mesa-Spring Valley Unified Superintendent David Feliciano told the  that the decision would have no effect on district policies and procedures.

“We remain committed to ensuring a safe and supportive learning environment for all students,” he said.

The Trump administration says it will withhold some federal funding from Chicago Public Schools over an initiative to improve outcomes for Black students and guidelines allowing transgender students to play sports and use facilities based on the gender with which they identify.

Craig Trainor, the acting assistant secretary of civil rights in the U.S. Department of Education, saying his office has found CPS violated anti-discrimination laws and will lose grant dollars through the Magnet School Assistance Program. The district, with a budget of roughly $10.2 billion, has a five-year, $15 million Magnet Schools Assistance Program grant it received last year.

The feds are demanding that the district abolish and issue a statement saying it will require students to compete in sports or use locker rooms and bathroom facilities based on their biological sex at birth, among other demands.

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However, Illinois law conflicts on both fronts, putting CPS in a difficult position. The state that outlines compliance with the Illinois Human Rights Law, including that schools must allow transgender students access to facilities that correspond to their gender identity. Separately, an Illinois law passed in 2024 and plan for serving Black students.

Chicago Public Schools said Wednesday in an emailed statement that it “does not comment on ongoing investigations.” Previously, its leaders have said that the Black Students Success Plan is a priority to address longstanding academic and discipline disparities that Black students face. They have in defiance of the Trump administration’s crackdown on race-based initiatives.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson said earlier this year that if it takes federal funding away from CPS because of the district’s diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts. His office also did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In response to earlier this year, the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights opened an investigation into the Black Student Success Plan, which sets goals to double the number of male Black teachers, reduce Black student suspensions, and teach Black history in more classrooms. Trainor said in his department’s interpretation, the initiative runs afoul of a U.S. Supreme Court decision last year banning the consideration of race in college admissions by offering added support to Black students and teachers exclusively.

“This is textbook racial discrimination, and no justification proffered by CPS can overcome the patent illegality of its racially exclusionary plan,” he wrote.

The OCR also of CPS, the Illinois State Board of Education, and suburban Deerfield Public School District 109 to look into their policies on transgender students using facilities and participating in school sports. Trainor said Chicago’s Guidelines Regarding the Support of Transgender and Gender Nonconforming Students violate Title IX, the federal law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in education.

District officials told Chalkbeat recently that the members of a new school board Black Student Achievement Committee tasked with overseeing the plan’s rollout will be unveiled later this month.

Stacy Davis Gates, the president of the Chicago Teachers Union, issued a statement decrying the federal move to withhold funds from CPS and saying the district will stay the course.

“We will not back down,” she said in the statement. “We will not apologize. Our duty is to our students, and no amount of political bullying will shake our commitment to them.”

Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.

The U.S. Supreme Court, in a potential landmark decision, upheld Tennessee’s law prohibiting gender affirming care for minors, saying children who seek the treatment don’t qualify as a protected class.

In United States v. Skrmetti, the high court overturning a lower court’s finding that the restrictions violate the constitutional rights of children seeking puberty blockers and hormones to treat gender dysphoria. The U.S. Court of Appeals overturned the district court’s decision and sent it to the high court.

The court’s three liberal justices dissented, writing that the court had abandoned transgender children and their families to “political whims.”

Tennessee lawmakers passed the legislation in 2023, leading to a lawsuit argued before the Supreme Court last December. The federal government, under the Biden administration, took up the case for the American Civil Liberties Union, Lambda Legal and three transgender teens, their families and a Memphis doctor who challenged the law, but the U.S. Department of Justice under President Donald Trump dropped its opposition.

In its ruling, the court said that the plaintiffs argued that Senate Bill 1 “warrants heightened scrutiny because it relies on sex-based classifications.” But the court found that neither of the classifications considered, those based on age and medical use, are determined on sex.

“Rather, SB1 prohibits healthcare providers from administering puberty blockers or hormones to minors for certain medical uses, regardless of a minor’s sex,” the ruling states.

The ruling says the application of the law “does not turn on sex,” either, because it doesn’t prohibit certain medical treatments for minors of one sex while allowing it for minors of the opposite sex.

The House Republican Caucus issued a statement saying, “This is a proud day for the Volunteer State and for all who believe in protecting the innocence and well-being of America’s children. Tennessee House Republicans are pleased by the court’s courage to stand firm against ideology that denies biological reality. The sterilization and disfigurement of children will no longer be normalized. As we celebrate the precedent set by this decision, we remain committed to leading the nation in safeguarding the health, safety and future of all children.”

Senate Majority Leader Jack Johnson, who sponsored the bill, said he is grateful the court ruled that states hold the authority to protect children from “irreversible medical procedures.”

“The simple message the Supreme Court has sent the world is ‘enough is enough,’” Johnson said in a statement.

The Tennessee Equality Project, an LGBTQ advocacy group, expressed dismay at the decision: “We are profoundly disappointed by the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to side with the Tennessee legislature’s anti-transgender ideology and further erode the rights of transgender children and their families and doctors. We are grateful to the plaintiffs, families, and the ACLU for fighting on behalf of more than across the nation.”

The group said gender-affirming care saves lives and is supported by medical groups such as the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Medical Association.

The court also rejected plaintiffs’ argument that the law enforces “a government preference that people conform to expectations about their sex.” 

The court found that laws that classify people on the basis of sex require closer scrutiny if they involve “impermissible stereotypes.” But if the law’s classifications aren’t covertly or overtly based on sex, heightened review by the court isn’t required unless the law is motivated by “invidious discriminatory purpose.”

“And regardless, the statutory findings on which SB1 is premised do not themselves evince sex-based stereotyping,” the ruling says.

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Tennessee Lookout maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Holly McCall for questions: info@tennesseelookout.com.

was originally reported by Orion Rummler of . .

On Thursday, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) published a of research on gender-affirming care for transgender youth, as directed by President Donald Trump. The agency used the release of the report to that available science does not support providing gender-affirming care to trans youth. LGBTQ+ advocacy groups worry the report will be used to further restrict gender-affirming care and to change medical guidelines in ways that harm trans youth.

The president mandated the report in an condemning the medical treatment — without evidence — as a form of mutilation, amid a broader push by the administration to from public life. Trump’s order asked the health agency to review the “best practices for promoting the health of children who assert gender dysphoria,” while to halt treatment or lose federal funding.

Now, the HHS has produced that report. The agency combed through research on the outcomes of puberty blockers, hormone replacement therapy, social transition, psychotherapy, and the rare cases of surgeries on adolescents and young adults diagnosed with gender dysphoria. 

Gender dysphoria, the reason that most trans people undergo , is a strong and persistent distress felt when one’s body is out of sync with their gender identity. Without treatment, gender dysphoria can lead to severe negative impacts in day-to-day life. 

The agency states in its of the report that the document is not meant to provide clinical practice guidelines or issue legislative or policy recommendations. However, the report does imply that health care providers should refuse to offer gender-affirming care to adolescents and young adults on the basis that such care comes with the potential for risk — despite little evidence for that risk actually being found in the report. 

“The evidence for benefit of pediatric medical transition is very uncertain, while the evidence for harm is less uncertain,” the executive summary states. “When medical interventions pose unnecessary, disproportionate risks of harm, healthcare providers should refuse to offer them even when they are preferred, requested, or demanded by patients.”

In its research review, the HHS determined that evidence measuring the effects of gender-affirming care on psychological outcomes, quality of life, regret and long-term health is of “very low” quality. This conclusion ignores decades of research, as well as a recent survey of in the United States that found an overwhelming majority report more life satisfaction after having transitioned. Access to gender-affirming care has been linked to and depression in trans youth, while gender-affirming surgeries have been found to for adults.

Even when analyzing research that the administration deemed low-bias, the HHS found “sparse” to no evidence of harm from gender-affirming care. What’s more, the report frequently found evidence demonstrating the benefits of gender-affirming care — though it ultimately downplays those findings as not significant. 

Available research on puberty blockers found high satisfaction ratings and low rates of regret. A systematic review of hormone replacement therapy described improved gender dysphoria and body satisfaction. Another found that hormone treatment leads to improved mental health. Two before-and-after studies reported reduced treatment needs or lower levels of suicidality and self-harm after hormone treatment. When measuring safety outcomes of hormone treatment, side effects did not have a major impact on treatment and complications were limited. 

Despite these findings, the Department of Health and Human Services advertised the report in a Thursday as one that “highlights a growing body of evidence pointing to significant risks” of gender-affirming care. At the White House briefing room Thursday, deputy chief of staff for policy Stephen Miller touted the new report and attributed the idea of being transgender as part of a “cancerous communist woke culture” that is “destroying this country.” 

There are side effects to many of the medications that transgender people — and cisgender people — take to receive gender-affirming care, as is the case with most medical treatments. These side effects, like the risk of decreased bone density when taking puberty blockers, are and communicated to patients.

LGBTQ+ advocacy organizations denounced the report as a political attack on transgender youth. Multiple groups said that the report’s endorsement of psychotherapy as a “noninvasive alternative” to puberty blockers and hormone treatment amounts to an endorsement of conversion therapy — a practice wherein mental health professionals try to change a youth’s sexual orientation or gender identity.

“It is already clear that this report is a willful distortion of the evidence intended to stoke fear about a field of safe and effective medicine that has existed for decades, in order to justify dangerous practices which amount to conversion therapy,” said Sinead Murano Kinney, health policy analyst at Advocates for Trans Equality. 

The Human Rights Campaign, the country’s largest LGBTQ+ rights organization, accused the HHS of producing a report that is attempting to lay the groundwork to replace medical care for trans and nonbinary people with conversion therapy. 

“Trans people are who we are. We’re born this way. And we deserve to live our best lives and have a fair shot and equal opportunity at living a good life,” said Jay Brown, chief of staff at the Human Rights Campaign. “This report … lays the groundwork to push parents and doctors aside and allow politicians to subject our kids to the debunked practice of conversion therapy.” 

No authors or contributors are named in the report or in its executive summary. The agency says these names are being initially withheld to “maintain the integrity of this process,” and states that chapters of the document were subject to peer review.

Ohio Republicans are dominating the “culture wars” over schools and students, joining other states in passing a barrage of new laws involving race, ethnicity and gender with several more in the pipeline.

Both emboldened by President Donald Trump’s success in the 2024 elections and as a backlash against former President Joe Biden, bills pressing the Make America Great agenda in schools have accelerated and come in rapid fire.

In the past year, Ohio’s Republican supermajority has defended in court its 2023 bans of transgender athletes participating in school sports and including hormone treatments and blockers for minors. 

Since Trump’s November victory, the state has also passed or is still pursuing far right bills including a and a opposed by the LGBTQ community, while also opening the door for religious study by public school students and attacking “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI)” efforts in both colleges and K-12 schools.

The bill affecting colleges, which also includes restrictions on teaching “controversial beliefs,” drew strong opposition but was

Ohio, the state with the sixth most students, is one of several passing similar bills — but the number and speed of them reflects the state’s shift to the right in recent years. Ohio was once one of the most reliable bellwether states in presidential elections, . But Ohio voted for Trump in 2020 and has now backed him in three state elections and the state is for what some consider extremism on education and other issues such as abortion. 

Troy McIntosh, executive director of education efforts for the Center for Christian Virtues, an Ohio nonprofit whose influence on legislators has grown in recent years, said Trump’s November win and the wave of bills are fueled by parent anger over how some social issues were framed and taught in online classes during the pandemic. It’s also a pushback against Biden giving transgender students more rights in ways some parents feel infringe on their own.

“Part of the message the electorate sent in that election is, ‘look, we need to fix this,’” McIntosh said. “This is not something we support – these progressive, radical in many ways, interpretations of law,  of culture, ethics. So, sure, the (Ohio) General Assembly is responding to what the electorate told them they wanted.”

Democrats, whose opposition to the Trump-aligned bills is regularly outvoted by the state’s Republican supermajority, said the bills distract from more pressing issues like school funding and improving learning, while also being destructive.

“Some of it is just the politics of fear,” said State Senator Kent Smith, a Democrat from the Cleveland area. “It’s a racist agenda, not the ‘out of many, we become one,’ which the country was founded on.”

Bills like those passing in Ohio have cropped up in several states.Texas and Florida have led the way, according to the conservative Heritage Foundation, with other states like Indiana, Oklahoma and Kentucky each passing or proposing different combinations of bills, some directly focused on schools and others lumping schools in with all public services., for example, to pass some form of a parental bill of rights.

Many have centered on rights of transgender youth, which flared into national controversy when the Biden administration made gender identity, not just biological sex, a protected class under Title IX, a 1972 law against sexual discrimination in education. That led to debates over schools allowing transgender youth to use bathrooms they choose and over transgender students participating on sports teams, usually male students transitioning to female.

“We’ve seen really a host of state prohibitions, either through executive order or by legislation, related to gender,” said Jonathan Butcher, a fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation. “Ohio is in the midst of it.”

Trump is leading the charge to undo Biden’s guidance, most notably with orders in January declaring that there are just two sexes — male and female — and that only biological sex, not gender identity, counts in federal law. But Butcher said states need to take action, particularly with no federal laws in place to carry Trump’s plan out.

“Executive orders are, of course, valuable and strong, but legislation is stronger,” he said. “You need provisions right in law in order for these things to not just take effect, but also remain in effect.”

Butcher said he isn’t as surprised as some at how much legislatures like Ohio’s have acted the last few years, saying it’s typical for changes and tempers to flare when emotional topics are debated, though he sympathizes with feelings of “whiplash” as the nation goes through it.

Ohio’s shift to the right didn’t start with these bills or Trump’s election. Vice President J.D. Vance was elected to the U.S. Senate for Ohio in 2022 and Republican Bernie Moreno just knocked off Democrat Sherrod Brown for Ohio’s other Senate seat in November. Republicans hold the majority in both state legislative houses, plus all major statewide offices including  auditor, attorney general and secretary of state. 

Republicans also prevailed in a statewide controversy over how state legislative districts are drawn that many say allows polarization of state politics to continue. Though the state supreme court ruled five times that Republicans had gerrymandered state House and Senate unfairly, Ohio voters sided with Republicans in November on a ballot issue that would have redrawn districts under a new process.

Critics charge that candidates don’t have to appeal to both sides, since districts are set up so races are really decided in Republican primaries.

“It (the legislature) has definitely moved towards a much more ideological conservative view,” said Christina Collins, a former state school board member who now heads the left-leaning Honesty for Ohio Education nonprofit.

“It is easier for them to keep up these attacks and to keep the rhetoric going and the vitriol and to keep stirring their base, which is what seems to be happening,” she said.

Ohio’s transgender bathroom ban, though proposed months earlier, passed after the November election. The state legislature followed that by passing a bill in December and creating a that requires schools to tell parents about “any request by a student to identify as a gender that does not align with the student’s biological sex.”

Schools must also inform parents before students can receive any mental health services, which would also include counseling over gender identity or sexual preference. While supporters praise the bill for letting parents, not schools, decide how to handle student sexuality issues, others blasted the bill as requiring schools to “out” students and expose them to violence.

Schools have until July to set policy for how to inform parents, but counselors are bracing for a “chilling effect” the bill would have on students seeking any type of help.

“Many students struggle with unsafe or unwelcoming homes, homes ravaged by poverty or stress, or even comfortable homes where students just sometimes feel the need to vent about family matters,” Douglas Cook testified in hearings on the bill on behalf of the Ohio School  Counselors Association. “School counselors’ offices are safe spaces for those students.”

“This will likely be incredibly jarring for students and result in their being scared that they will lose the privacy of having a safe listener available to them at school,” Cook added.

This year, after Trump started his own campaign in January against what he called “radical indoctrination” in schools, Ohio quickly passed a ban on DEI in training and hiring in state colleges. The law also regulates teaching of “controversial beliefs” including foreign policy, diversity, immigration, abortion and climate change.

Gov. Mike DeWine signed that ban Friday after heated debates with 1,500 pieces of written testimony submitted and in protest. Opponents labeled it the “HIgher Education Destruction Act” that amounts to state censorship of educators.

State Sen. Jerry Cirino, the bill’s author said it “will return our public universities and colleges to their rightful mission of education rather than indoctrination.”

In the latest move, bills blocking DEI in training and hiring, though not lessons, in K-12 schools are being heard in the Ohio House and Senate.

that would yank funding from schools that let students change their name or pronouns and another bill that would so schools can post them.

Support from voters for the new laws isn’t clear, though a found some backing. The poll found residents backed Trump’s order that there are just two sexes 61 percent to 32 percent. Support for anti-DEI policies was more narrow, 49 percent to 42 percent.

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate failed to advance a measure Monday night that would bar transgender students from participating on women’s school sports teams consistent with their gender identity.

The bill would help codify into law President Donald Trump’s , which carries out this exact ban and threatens to rescind federal funds from “educational programs” if schools .

The move also reflects a broader GOP-led push to enact . Across the country, an increasing number of states have passed laws banning trans students from participating in sports that align with their gender identity.

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The party-line 51-45 vote could not garner 60 senators to break through the legislative filibuster.

Four senators did not vote, including Republican Sens. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia and Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming as well as Democratic Sens. Elissa Slotkin of Michigan and Peter Welch of Vermont.

Ahead of the vote, Sen. Tammy Baldwin said on the Senate floor Monday that she stood in “strong opposition to any attempt by the federal government to meddle in decisions about who can and cannot participate in school sports.”

“This is a decision for local communities, where players and parents can participate in that discussion at the local level. This is a decision for sports leagues to thoughtfully craft policy that actually takes seriously what is best for all players, not blanket mandates that will undoubtedly have unintended consequences for the safety of all students,” the Wisconsin Democrat said.

Alabama GOP Sen. Tommy Tuberville  in the Senate in January, and the bill gained several Republican .

“Thankfully, President Trump just signed an executive order that said, ‘No more — no more federal money to any state that allows this to happen,’ but you have to understand, this only lasts as long as President Trump’s in office, so we need this vote … to pass so we can make this into law,” Tuberville said on the Senate floor before the vote.

Title IX

The bill seeks to amend Title IX so that “sex shall be recognized based solely on a person’s reproductive biology and genetics at birth.”

Title IX is a landmark federal civil rights law that bars schools that receive federal funding from practicing sex-based discrimination.

Trump’s executive order asks federal agencies to interpret Title IX in a way that complies with the order.

The president’s initiative provoked complex questions about enforcement mechanisms and consequences for schools that do not comply. The administration has already launched a number of  across the .

House action

Meanwhile, the  to the Senate’s in January, which GOP Rep. Greg Steube of Florida introduced.

That measure advanced 218-206, with all House Democrats in opposition except for Texas U.S. Reps. Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez. North Carolina Democratic Rep. Don Davis voted “present.”

The , an LGBTQ+ advocacy group, noted that there has been “considerable disinformation and misinformation about what the inclusion of transgender youth in sports entails” and that trans students’ sports participation “has been a non-issue.”

At least 25 states have enacted a law that bans trans students from taking part in sports that align with their gender identity, according to the , an independent think tank.

Last updated 7:49 p.m., Mar. 3, 2025

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Denver resident Leslie Williams’ daughter, who is transgender, turned 18 in December, something she had been looking forward to given the lessened restrictions on access to gender-affirming care for adults.

Williams and her family moved to Denver from Kentucky in 2023 so her daughter could access hormone replacement therapy, and they’ve gone to Children’s Hospital Colorado since she was 16 years old. She takes estrogen tablets and gets regular lab testing to ensure proper levels.

“It took a while for us to get in, but since then everything’s gone very smoothly,” Williams said. “The physicians have been wonderful. Everybody was wonderful. We had a really good experience there every time we’ve been.”

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Williams said she received a message from the hospital this week notifying her they can no longer provide gender-affirming care to anyone under 19 years old.

“She’s really been struggling a lot lately,” Williams said. “The last two weeks have been really rough, and then getting the notification that her care is going to be possibly suspended or delayed has been a really big blow to her.”

Colorado Newsline, confirming the message Williams received, that Children’s Hospital Colorado sent to staffers telling them that the hospital had stopped offering all gender-affirming medical treatment to patients 18 years old and younger.

President Donald Trump issued an on Jan. 28 that prohibits the federal government from funding gender-affirming care for anyone under 19 and threatens to pull other funding from any entity that offers such care. It also removes Medicare and Medicaid coverage for gender-affirming care, among other changes.

Gender-affirming care, endorsed by both the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics, can range from non-medical interventions like haircuts and name changes to services like hormone therapy and surgery to support the patient’s gender identity.

Access to gender-affirming care has made a “big difference” for her daughter’s self esteem and the way she perceives herself, Williams said. She said she’s scrambling now to find another solution since other clinics are also shutting down access for anyone under 19, and anyone that does offer care has long wait times.

“It’s just really sad to see,” Williams said. “Trans kids already have to go through a lot and they already have higher than normal suicide rates, and so it’s just a really scary time for trans people.”

Children’s Hospital Colorado said in a statement it will continue to provide “behavioral health and supportive care services once approved prescriptions for current patients expire.” The hospital never offered gender-affirming surgical care to patients under 18.

“Like other hospitals across the country, we will continue to assess the rapidly evolving healthcare landscape,” the hospital statement said. “We care deeply about our gender-diverse patients and their families, and we will carefully and responsibly support them as we evolve the model of care we offer.”

Colorado saw an increased need for service following the election. The Trevor Project, a crisis intervention organization for LGBTQ+ youth, on Nov. 6, the day after the election, than in the weeks prior. In 2023, the organization that 90% of LGBTQ+ youth felt that the current political environment negatively affects their well-being.

Broomfield resident Jessica Broadbent’s 15-year-old son is transgender and has gone to Denver Health for gender-affirming care since he was 12. The first step in his transition was changing his name, a decision Broadbent said he came to all on his own.

“This has been all him making these decisions and me just kind of helping support him along the way and getting all the professional help that we can,” Broadbent said. “It’s been some time, and he’s made these decisions slowly, surely and with informed and professional input. So it’s really frustrating on all levels.”

Her son started taking puberty blockers, and switched to weekly testosterone shots once he turned 14. He recently switched to a daily testosterone cream instead, because he has a fear of needles.

Broadbent said she’s scared for how her son will be affected should he lose access to his medications, as gender-affirming care has been “life changing” for him. She has had “some very disheartening conversations” with her son in recent weeks, and she’s worried more about the mental and emotional consequences than the physical effects if he loses access to his medication.

“It’s frustrating having my kid feeling like he has to suppress who he is, what he believes in, hide to be safe,” Broadbent said.

Denver Health stopped providing some gender-affirming care this week, the reported. The health system said in a Jan. 30 that the Trump order “includes criminal and financial consequences for those who do not comply” and puts at risk its ability to participate in federal programs like Medicare and Medicaid, which represents “a significant portion of Denver Health’s funding.”

“Denver Health is committed to and deeply concerned for the health and safety of our gender diverse patients under the age of 19 in light of the executive order regarding youth gender-affirming care,” the statement says. “We recognize this order will impact gender-diverse youth, including increased risk of depression, anxiety and suicidality.”

Existing patients should continue with any scheduled appointments, and Denver Health will work privately with its patients to determine the best changes to their medical care, the statement said.

Shelby Wieman, a spokesperson for Colorado Gov. Jared Polis, a Democrat, said the governor wants to ensure “every Coloradan can access the healthcare they need, no matter who they are or how they identify.”

“We are continuing to evaluate Trump’s executive order, which blatantly attacks members of the LGBTQ community, to understand its impact in Colorado and how people can continue to get access to needed care,” Wieman said in a statement.

Williams said she’s seen the governor talk about “protecting trans kids and protecting trans folks in Colorado, and I don’t know how much they can really do when it’s federal funding that’s being cut.” But she wants to see elected officials talk more about how they can actually make a difference.

UCHealth spokesperson Kelli Christensen said the system has only offered gender-affirming care to patients 18 and older, but after the executive order, it will only offer services to patients 19 and older. That includes gender-affirming surgeries as well as medical therapies listed in the executive order.

“We know these changes may be challenging, especially for 18-year-old patients previously approved for gender affirming care, and behavioral health services will be available to help support our patients as they navigate these changes,” Christensen said in a statement.

A spokesperson for AdventHealth said it does not offer gender-affirming care to anyone under 18. HCA HealthONE hospitals also do not offer gender-affirming care. Spokesperson Stephanie Sullivan said its physicians would consult with patients, but they don’t offer any treatments.

‘It’s supposed to be safe’

Broadbent said she plans to talk to her son’s doctor about getting a three-month supply of his medication before the end of the month. She is also looking for other providers that might be able to prescribe his testosterone cream without putting access to federal funding at risk.

“It’s kind of putting us all up against the wall,” Broadbent said. “I didn’t expect it so soon.”

Being in Colorado where “it’s supposed to be safe,” Broadbent said she thought the state would be “somewhat insulated,” though not immune to pressure from the federal government. She and her family moved to Colorado from Florida eight years ago.

“Part of the appeal of being here is the access to care. It’s part of why we paid more to live here,” she said.

Broadbent and her husband are ready to pack up everything they have and leave the country if that’s ultimately what will be best for their children. But her son is a freshman in high school, and he wants to finish school, where he’s already established roots.

Colorado officials need to acknowledge what is happening and to work actively to protect their constituents, Broadbent said. She called the office of U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette’s, a Denver Democrat, and the office shared information on efforts to fight the executive order, a conversation Broadbent said gave her “a little bit of hope.”

In a statement to Newsline, DeGette described the executive order as “cruel” and said it “ignores the fact that this kind of care is supported by every major medical association.” She said executive actions like the ones Trump has taken do not have the authority to override the U.S. Constitution, legal precedent, or federal statute.

“Trump’s actions, which are not based on science or accepted medical practice, are demonizing an already vulnerable group of Americans and denying them the care they need to live as their true selves,” DeGette said.

Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser, a Democrat who is running for governor in 2026, joined a group of other attorneys general in Wednesday. An executive order from the president cannot make gender-affirming care illegal, because there is no federal law that does, Weiser said in a statement.

The statement said a U.S. Justice Department order last week stated that federal agencies cannot pause financial awards or obligations on the basis of an executive order, meaning “federal funding to institutions that provide gender-affirming care continues to be available, irrespective of the recent executive order.”

“As state attorneys general, we stand firmly in support of health care policies that respect the dignity and rights of all people,” the statement says. “Health care decisions should be made by patients, families, and doctors, not by politicians trying to use their power to restrict freedoms. Gender-affirming care is essential, life-saving medical treatment that supports individuals in living as their authentic selves.”

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Colorado Newsline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Quentin Young for questions: info@coloradonewsline.com.

ATHENS, Ohio — Local school districts and colleges are scrambling to determine how they will implement recent state legislation that requires transgender people to use the bathroom of the sex they were assigned at birth. 

In late November, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signed  into law. In addition to prescribing bathroom use for all persons using school restrooms, the statute also prohibits public and private educational institutions from constructing multi-person, multi-gender restrooms.  

Ohio’s law brings the number of  to an even dozen. 

Legislation targeting transgender people has  across the country in the past 10 years, limiting access to public restrooms and healthcare and participation in sports, among other measures. In 2024 alone, Ohio legislators  — out of 14 that were introduced.

Both of Athens County’s state legislators  for SB 104; Sen. Brian Chavez (R-Marietta) sponsored the bill. 

As Jay Edwards (R-Nelsonville) is term-limited,  of Marietta will replace him next year. In an email, Ritter said, “I appreciate Representative Edwards voting to ensure the privacy of Ohio’s students.”

The law takes effect on Feb. 24, 2025; 90 days after DeWine signed the bill on the day before Thanksgiving. 

SB 104 puts school districts in a “tenuous” situation, Athens City School District Superintendent Tom Gibbs told the Independent. 

“Currently, there is some disagreement between the Federal Department of Education and guidance we have been provided and what is included in this new statute,” Gibbs said in an email. 

The district is consulting legal counsel about “to determine how best to move forward,” Gibbs wrote.

“District employees will be directed to continue to support and protect the rights of all students for the next 90 days while we await guidance from our legal counsel,” Gibbs said in an email. 

Federal Hocking Local Schools Superintendent Jason Spencer declined to comment, saying that he had not yet discussed the bill with the Federal-Hocking Board of Education. Alexander, Nelsonville-York and Trimble local school district superintendents did not respond to requests for comments.

Potential conflict with federal law

SB 104 presents Ohio educators with a Catch-22, Gibbs explained. Employees who don’t follow the new requirements can be reported for violating state law; if they do follow it, they risk violating federal anti-discrimination laws, including Title IX. 

 of the Education Amendments of 1972, prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in “any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.” 

Title IX “ to transgender students in public schools and universities,” Gibbs said, citing the . Athens City Schools’ Title IX coordinator is Director of Curriculum & Development Sommer McCorkle.

SB 104 does not contain any language about enforcement or penalties for violations of its restrictions. Similar bills in other states include fines and jail time as sanctions for violations, The Buckeye Flame . 

Gibbs noted that the district has standing  “that specifically call for protecting student rights based on gender identity.” But SB 104 will force the district to “change or modify multiple policies to be in line with the state statute,” he said.

“And, District employees will be faced with the daily task of ascertaining when to follow Federal Title IX Guidance and when to follow the State Statutes related to transgender students,” Gibbs said. “It is difficult to say on one hand that we do not discriminate based on gender identity and then on the other to limit student’s participation in athletics or even where they can use the bathroom.”

The implied changes from SB 104 are “especially frustrating because we’ve had these policies and procedures in place for years without any complaint and before this even became the Federal guidance on the matter,” Gibbs said in an email.

“The complete lack of any nod towards the ‘local control’ that state legislators frequently espouse in regards to schools and municipalities apparently goes out the window in relation to how we address and protect the rights of transgender students,” Gibbs stated.

Gibbs also pointed to ongoing Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals case Doe v. Bethel, in which parents and students are suing Bethel Local School District for allowing a transgender child to use the restroom that matches her gender, the Ohio Capital Journal . 

“I am hopeful that case will come to [a] conclusion soon, as it would provide some additional context to the legal landscape surrounding this issue,” Gibbs said in an email.

A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Education declined to comment on SB 104, but did note that federal laws supersede state laws.

Higher education

In an email, an Ohio University spokesperson said that OU “is aware that Senate Bill 104 has been formally signed into law, and we are currently reviewing the final version of the bill and its potential impact on established University processes and procedures.”

The spokesperson added, “OHIO has long been committed to fostering an inclusive, respectful environment for all students, staff and visitors, and we will continue to work to ensure that our public restroom signage and accommodations continue to meet the needs of our University community and remain compliant with all applicable state and federal laws.”

Casey Plett, an assistant professor of English and film at OU, said the university has not yet provided her with any guidance regarding the new law. 

“Anecdotally, from what I can see … it is increasing stress levels,” Plett said of her students. “I would worry very much about students who might be in the closet, who … might keep their identities secret … or keep their gender secret because of this, which is just a shame, and something that most other students don’t have to do.” 

For Plett, the “” nature of anti-trans bathroom bills is not founded in reality.

“The opponents of trans youth, specifically, in public life — it’s always called an ‘experience of experimentation,’ and that is not true,” Plett said. “I think that it is bills like this that are the experimentation … It is making these kinds of draconian laws that — none of these laws existed four years ago. It is this kind of legislative activity that is the experiment, and I am very doubtful it was going to have good effects.”

Ohio University senior Rey De Spain, who is transgender, echoed Plett’s sentiments.

“I think it’s a massive overreach into the private lives of citizens and especially students,” they said.

De Spain said that in Athens, “I’ve never really encountered any problems using the public restrooms here.” However, since their freshman year, “I definitely think that transphobia has become a lot more visible.” 

In De Spain’s experience, “People are a lot more comfortable being openly transphobic … A lot of people feel more comfortable than I would like, verbally harassing others on the streets, especially when they’re drunk … I expect a little bit of that, but I do feel like this campus has become a lot less friendly already in the past couple years, when I compare it to my freshman year. I felt like it was an extremely safe place, and I was never really hassled.”

Overall, though, De Spain said they feel “very fortunate that I live in an area where people mostly mind their own business.”

De Spain believes that bathrooms already operate on a “good faith” system in which legal documents aren’t required to attend to bodily functions.

 “What all of us want in the bathroom is privacy, and a place to do our business and then wash our hands and leave,” De Spain said. “I think that a lot of the people pushing legislation like this don’t seem to understand how public restrooms function in the real world, and they think they’re protecting people, when really they’re putting people in danger.”

Hocking College Vice President of Student Affairs Hannah Guadda, who is the school’s  coordinator, said in an email the institution “is currently reviewing the legislation to ensure compliance while maintaining our commitment to a safe, inclusive environment for all students. As we assess the bill’s impact, we remain dedicated to supporting our diverse student body.”

Resources: LGBTQ+ youths in crisis may contact the Trevor Project at 866-4-U-Trevor for assistance; adults in crisis, contact the National Trans Lifeline: 877-565-8860. The 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline is also available; in case of emergency, always call 911.

This was originally published on .

A federal judge ordered Hanover County Public Schools late Friday to temporarily cease blocking a transgender middle school student from trying out for and, if selected, playing on a sports team this school year.

In February, the student, represented by the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia and the law firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP, filed a lawsuit claiming the school division violated Title IX and the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution.

ACLU stated that the ruling found that the school board “likely violated” both when it banned the Hanover student from the tennis team.

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“This order is a reminder to school boards that protecting transgender young people is part of protecting girls’ sports,” said legal director Eden Heilman, in a statement. “And it’s a flashing red light to any Virginia school board that might be tempted to think that VDOE’s anti-trans model policies give it license to abuse its power. As the court reminded Hanover County School Board in its ruling, no state policies can shield Virginia schools from accountability for violating federal law.”

Last year, Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s administration overhauled the model policies for transgender and nonbinary students designed under former Gov. Ralph Northam to protect the privacy and rights of such students.

In February, ACLU and Freshfields filed three lawsuits challenging the Virginia Department of Education on the policies that some schools have adopted.

In opposition to a student’s right to decide who finds out about their gender status out of fear of being bullied or harassed, the governor sided with parents’ rights, directing the administration to overhaul the policies.

The administration the policies to require parental approval for any changes to students’ “names, nicknames, and/or pronouns,” direct schools to keep parents “informed about their children’s well-being” and require that student participation in activities and athletics and use of bathrooms be based on sex, “except to the extent that federal law otherwise requires.”

Freshfields and ACLU filed the Hanover case in two courts, the Eastern District of Virginia and the Hanover County Circuit Court. The third lawsuit involving a York County student was in July. That suit claimed that at least one teacher had refused to address the student by her correct first name.

Editor’s note: This story was updated to reflect that the Hanover case is being heard separately in the federal and county courts. 

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Virginia Mercury maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Samantha Willis for questions: info@virginiamercury.com. Follow Virginia Mercury on and .

In a move condemned by advocates and lawmakers as an attack on trans students who fear any change to could also increase bullying and violence, passed 8-3 Wednesday evening. 

“We know sports build self confidence and a sense of belonging, which is especially critical for this group of students. Rather than excluding our trans students we ought to be working together to wrap our arms around them. They need love, encouragement and support, not political attacks,” said NYC Schools Chancellor David Banks Wednesday evening. 

After citing statistics that one in three trans youth are suicidal and one in three are survivors of abuse, Banks called the resolution “despicable” and, in an exasperated tone, posed a question: “Would you just leave the kids alone?” 

At a packed District 2 community education council meeting, ACLU civil rights lawyer and District 2 parent Chase Strangio pointed out the current gender guidelines align with state law. “So this resolution does nothing but target trans young people,” Santiago said. 

“I will not sit idly by and see the same misinformed efforts be pushed in my own school district. I will not let NYC, the birthplace and home of some of the most powerful trans people in history, be yet another testing ground for rhetoric that expels my community,” said Strangio, who is trans.

The resolution urges that a reevaluation committee be formed to include female athletes, parents, coaches, medical professionals and evolutionary biology experts, and claims current guidelines “present challenges” particularly to girls. The resolution’s primary sponsor, Maud Maron, said the resolution is in essence asking to hear from all “impacted voices,” according to . 

Given the Chancellor’s condemnation and that community education councils are advisory, it is unlikely DOE leaders will follow the council’s recommendation. 

In December, Banks also used the word “despicable” to describe comments made by Maron in a private chat, which included “trans kids don’t exist.” Parents and advocates have grown increasingly frustrated with the Chancellor’ broken promise to “take action,” made more than three months ago. 

In the time since Banks made his pledge, Community Board 2 issued a resolution demanding the DOE acknowledge and require parent leaders adhere to respective guidelines on bullying and fostering a safe learning environment for all students, particularly LGBTQ students. The late February resolution also encouraged penalties for parents found in violation of Chancellor regulations, including verbal and written warnings and/or suspension of involvement.

Separately, several District 2 CEC members wrote in a February email to Banks that went unanswered that parents’ and students’ rights and protections “continue to be unabashedly violated.” 

In the district which includes hyper-liberal neighborhoods like Chelsea and Greenwich Village, the resolution and restricting LGBTQ student rights doesn’t hold broad public support, parents say. 

“There really wasn’t a debate in our community,” said district 2 parent and CEC member Gavin Healy. “It was very much like ‘we don’t like this, we don’t want this.’”

Dozens of community members spoke out against the gender resolution with only one expressing support. All but two of 175 emails received by the council in advance of its vote were against its passage. 

At least 25 states, concentrated in the south and midwest, have introduced consistent with their gender identity. 

But the resolution’s introduction and passage in New York City is unsurprising, given parent leaders with conservative-leaning education desires endorsed by Parent Leaders for Accelerated Curriculum make up . The group, known as PLACE, was co-founded by Maron. 

“I think they really want something that they can take back to Moms for Liberty and use it as a PR stunt — look, even in Manhattan there’s this concern,” said Healy. “It has to do with that national, moral panic that they are fueling. It’s fodder.”

Conservative parent voices have been rising in the city. Moms for Liberty, which advocates for parental rights and is categorized as an extremist hate organization by the Southern Poverty Law Center, opened its first chapter in NYC last year. Maron spoke on a the group held in January. 

This particular gender resolution is “legally unenforceable and dangerous,” said David Bloomfield, Brooklyn College education, law and public policy professor. A is currently underway in suburban Nassau County, New York, where a attempted to ban trans women and girls from public athletic facilities. 

Bloomfield said Maron was “…exercising her rights as an individual and as an elected official to state her policy preferences, which have been no secret. She’s following through essentially on what her voters asked for,” adding in the past, chancellors such as Richard Carranza have

The gender resolution passed on the same night the council passed another seemingly at odds, one affirming support of LGBTQ students and families. Maron was the only council member to abstain from voting on the resolution in support of LGBTQ students. 

Since December, a petition to have Maron removed from the Stuyvesant High School leadership team has . It circulated after she was quoted in a NY Post article calling an anonymous student author a “coward,” accusing them of “Jew hatred,” calling for their name to be public for their op-ed in the student newspaper.

Many parents and students feel her actions constituted bullying and threaten free speech at the school.

“The mission is the kids. Getting through the classes. Keeping them safe … They just don’t need this added pressure,” said one parent speaking on condition of anonymity. “[Maron] politicizes every situation she can and I feel like any statement she makes is for her own personal gain. It’s not for the school, it’s not for the students.” 

Reem Khalifa, a junior at Stuyvesant, said recent events have been disheartening and made her “fearful for the people around me. Do they recognize and hold the same beliefs?” 

Maron did not return a request for comment. 

“The DOE is trying to shield themselves from liability,” said Healy, “even if that means leaving people in the community vulnerable.” 

Gov. said Monday he will be “heavily involved” in the push for an this legislative session as the idea continues to face an uphill battle in the Texas House.

Abbott, in an interview with The Texas Tribune, said he would be traveling the state to make the case directly to voters, particularly in rural areas. Such a program away from public schools as parents use that money to pay for their children’s private school, online schooling or private tutors. Similar proposals have typically from a coalition of Democrats and rural GOP lawmakers.

“Among Republican rural voters, about 80% support this,” Abbott said, “and I think that Republican officeholders will see that more and more, and I think there may be a change in the perception of what their voters expect of them in Austin, Texas.”

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Abbott addressed that topic and a few others in an interview on the heels of his State of the State address Thursday.

Education savings accounts

One of the emergency items that Abbott announced was “education freedom,” including education savings accounts for every parent. Those would allow the state to deposit taxpayer funds that parents could then use to help pay for sending their kids to schools outside the traditional public education system.

State House Speaker , R-Beaumont, has said he is fine with an up-or-down vote on those kinds of proposals, but he has noted that the House has previously rejected them by wide margins. In rural parts of Texas, public school systems are major employers and a source of community pride. Many rural regions have few private schools.

In the interview, Abbott sought to distinguish between rural Republican lawmakers and their voters, saying “rural Republican voters strongly support this.” Last year, 88% of GOP primary voters approved of a nonbinding proposition saying “parents and guardians should have the right to select schools, whether public or private, for their children, and the funding should follow the student.” Large majorities .

To build legislative support, Abbott said he would be “taking this show on the road across the state of Texas to appeal to voters themselves.” He spoke at a “parental empowerment night” last month in Corpus Christi that was hosted by the Texas Public Policy Foundation, the Austin-based conservative think tank. And he headlined a similar event Monday night in Temple, appearing in the backyard of the new chair of the , state Rep. of Killeen.

Buckley has been opposed to vouchers in the past, but advocates have expressed optimism that he is now open to the idea.

“I think that there at least is the opportunity to have this have a better chance than ever before, in part because of the makeup of the committee, but also in part because of the makeup of the constituents of the members,” Abbott said.

Florida and DeSantis

Abbott shrugged off the idea that he is locked in a conservative policy rivalry with Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor who is likely to run for president in 2024. Abbott is also a possible White House contender, though he is seen as less likely — and formidable — as DeSantis for now.

“The reality is we really just focus on Texas and working for our constituents here in our state,” Abbott said.

While Abbott did not mention Florida or DeSantis by name, he did boast that Texas “has been a national leader” on restricting abortion and expanding gun rights. He alluded to the laws he signed in 2021 that banned most abortions in Texas and allowed the permitless carry of handguns — two conservative policy priorities in which Florida still trails Texas.

Abbott also argued that Texas has led the nation with its 2021 law that bans large social media companies from blocking users’ posts based on their political viewpoints. He said he believes it is the only such law in the country “that’s been upheld by courts so far.”

Abbott said Texas was even ahead of the curve with a 2021 law preventing local bans on natural gas as a fuel source. That issue became a national controversy recently after the Biden administration that it was interested in outlawing gas stoves, a notion it quickly denied.

Abbott’s remarks come as DeSantis is preparing to make his . He is set to visit Houston and Dallas over the first weekend in March to headline annual fundraising dinners for the county parties in each city.

Paxton settlement

Attorney General has stirred unease in the Legislature with a tentative to end a whistleblower lawsuit brought by former deputies. Phelan said last week that he personally opposed using taxpayer dollars on the settlement, which would have to be approved by the Legislature.

Abbott also has a role in the process as the person ultimately responsible for signing the state budget into law or vetoing it. While he did not voice outright opposition to taxpayer dollars being used for the settlement, he did echo Phelan in saying Paxton will have to convince lawmakers to sign off on the deal.

“It may or may not even reach my desk, but as Speaker Phelan made clear, this is an issue that the attorney general is going to have to fully explain to both the House and the Senate,” Abbott said. “I’m also in the boat of having to learn more about this.”

At the same time, Abbott seemed to downplay any particular controversy over the settlement, saying it is “just like every other budget-type issue I encounter.”

“I need full information on the budget issue to determine if I’m gonna sign it or not,” Abbott said.

Paxton appeared at a legislative hearing on the state budget Tuesday where the settlement was a topic. State Rep. , D-Houston, asked Paxton if he would be willing to pay the settlement out of his campaign funds rather than state coffers. Assistant Attorney General Chris Hilton jumped in to say the whistleblowers are suing the attorney general’s office for retaliation, not Paxton personally. He said there’s no precedent for an individual paying out a whistleblower case from their own money.

“If we lose at trial, the damages exposure would obviously be higher than that,” Hilton said.

Health care for transgender kids

As conservative activists continue to lobby for legislation banning certain health care therapies for transgender kids, Abbott said in the interview that it is a proposal he would sign if it reaches his desk.

Abbott and other Republicans’ rhetoric has focused on surgeries for transgender kids, though medical experts say those procedures are very rare. Abbott suggested such surgeries are “something that a person should at least wait until they’re adult to make a decision on.” LGBTQ advocates have warned that such rhetoric is dangerous for kids’ mental health.

Still, “ending child gender modification” is one of Lt. Gov. ’s top . It is also a legislative priority for the Texas GOP. Phelan has been less clear on the issue, suggesting last month it could be considered by a select committee that he later appointed a Democrat to chair.

Abbott already took on health care for transgender kids last year when he ordered the Department of Family and Protective Services to investigate transition-related care for children as . Yet that did not satisfy Abbott’s intraparty critics, who continue to push for a legislative solution. A similar measure failed in 2021.

Abbott declined to put the proposal on any of the calls for the special sessions in 2021, saying its chances of passing in the House were “nil.” However, he did express support for a law at some point in the future that defines transition-related care — like puberty blockers and hormone therapy — as child abuse.

​​“We do need it as a law,” Abbott , “and it would be stronger obviously if the Legislature would pass it, and I want to see the Legislature pass it.”

Disclosure: Texas Public Policy Foundation has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete .

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Under the proposed changes, announced Thursday, the law would protect victims against discrimination based not just on sex but on sexual orientation and gender identity, in effect adding transgender students as a protected class. Current regulations are silent on these students’ rights.

But the proposal sidesteps the question of transgender athletes’ rights to compete in girls’ sports, an explosive issue administration officials said will get its own set of regulations at a later date.

“This is personal to me as an educator and as a father,” U.S. Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said during the announcement. “I want the same opportunities afforded to my daughter and my son — and my transgender cousin — so they can achieve their potential and reach their dreams.”

The changes come 50 years to the day after President Richard Nixon signed the federal civil rights law that bans sex discrimination in education.

Cardona on Thursday noted that LGBTQ youth “face bullying and harassment, experience higher rates of anxiety, depression, and suicide, and too often grow up feeling that they don’t belong.”

The proposed regulations, he said, “send a loud message to these students and all our students: You belong in our schools. You have worthy dreams and incredible talents. You deserve the opportunity to shine authentically and unapologetically. The Biden-Harris administration has your back.”

Education and civil rights groups welcomed the proposed rules, with Ronn Nozoe, CEO of the saying they “greatly strengthen principals’ abilities to ensure schools provide what students need.” 

Amit Paley, CEO of, a suicide prevention and mental health organization for LGBTQ youth, applauded the administration’s bid to extend Title IX protections to sexual orientation and gender identity, saying, “School should be a place where students learn and are comfortable being themselves, not a source of bullying and discrimination.”

But the proposed rules irked some conservative groups. In a, Nicole Neily, president of Parents Defending Education, called the move a “federal overreach” and dubbed the proposed regulations “The Biden administration’s ‘Must Say They’ rewrite of Title IX,” refering to the preferred pronoun of some who are transgender. 

“American families should be deeply concerned by the proposed rewrite of Title IX,” Neily said. “From rolling back due process protections, to stomping on the First Amendment, to adding ‘sexual orientation and gender identity’ into a statute that can only be so changed by Congressional action, the Biden Administration has shown that they place the demands of a small group of political activists above the concerns of millions of families across the country.”

Taken together, the proposed regulations would create a sharp contrast to Trump administration rules adopted in 2020 under then-Education Secretary Betsy DeVos. Under DeVos, for instance, schools were prohibited from opening Title IX cases if an alleged assault took place away from school grounds. Under the new rules, schools would be required to address “hostile environments” in programs and activities, even if the conduct that contributed to the hostile environment “occurred off-campus or outside the United States,” a senior official told reporters.

“Our view now is that the existing regulations do not best fulfill Congress’ mandate in Title IX,” the official said. “There is more we can do to ensure that students do not experience sex discrimination in school.”

Cardona’s proposed changes both expand the definition of sexual harassment and potentially limit opportunities for students accused of sexual assault or harassment to confront their accusers. Administration officials said the new regulations would require schools to take “prompt and effective” action on campus sex discrimination.

But they also said the regulations in effect loosen requirements on schools’ sex assault investigations: The proposed rules, for instance, would “permit but not require” schools to hold live hearings in which accused students can directly confront survivors.

A senior department official, who briefed reporters Thursday on background, said the administration has concluded that a live hearing, which resembles a courtroom procedure, “is one, but not the only way, to address investigation and to determine what has occurred.” The official noted that the vast majority of schools were not conducting live hearings before the Trump administration began requiring them in 2020. “And it was clear to us that a live hearing was not essential to determination of outcomes and a fair process,” the official said.

In a statement, Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC), said the move “returns to the deeply flawed campus disciplinary process of the Obama Administration, which led to hundreds of inconsistent judgements and more than 300 legal challenges. The existing rule struck a balance that follows the law and is fair to both parties.”

Notably absent from Thursday’s announcement was any mention of Title IX’s application to athletics, which has caused a furor due to a handful of transgender athletes’ bids to compete in girls’ sporting events.

The administration said it will engage in a separate rulemaking process to address the law’s application to athletics and gender, but offered no immediate timeline for the process. A senior department official said the topic “deserves its own separate rule-making process.”

Administration officials have previously said Title IX, which prohibits sex discrimination and harassment in programs receiving federal funds, will echo the in Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia, which extended protections against sexual harassment and discrimination in the workplace to LGBTQ employees.

While the department’s interpretation of the Bostock ruling doesn’t mention sports, the Biden administration last year filed in a West Virginia case in which a transgender girl who wants to compete with girls on her middle school cross country team is challenging the state’s 2021 law banning students born as male from participating in girls’ sports. 

A group of 15 Republican-led states, led by Montana Attorney General, has threatened to challenge the regulations in court,. Since last year, a dozen states have passed legislation prohibiting trans females from competing in girls’ and women’s sports. 

Last week, the , the world governing body for swimming, voted to prohibit transgender athletes from competing in high-level women’s competitions unless they began medical treatments to suppress testosterone production early in their lives.  

The group, known internationally as Fédération internationale de natation, or FINA, said it would also a new, “open” category for athletes who identify as women but do not meet the requirement to compete against people who were female at birth.

By contrast, World Cup and Olympic soccer star Megan Rapinoe last week that she is “100 percent supportive of trans inclusion” in sports, noting that what most people know about the topic comes from “relentless” conservative talking points that don’t reflect reality. 

“Show me the evidence that trans women are taking everyone’s scholarships, are dominating in every sport, are winning every title,” she said. “I’m sorry, it’s just not happening. So we need to start from inclusion, period. And as things arise, I have confidence that we can figure it out. But we can’t start at the opposite. That is cruel. And frankly, it’s just disgusting.”

The public has 60 days to send comments on the new proposal, which could take several months to finalize. 

Every couple of months, Adamalis Vigil drives eight hours from the Rio Grande Valley to North Texas so her 13-year-old transgender daughter Adelyn can receive health care. They talk and sing the whole trip.

The care she receives there is unavailable in her hometown but pivotal to her sense of identity — and her mental health.

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“It makes me feel who I truly am, and I don’t feel singled out for not being like other girls in school anymore,” Adelyn said. “It’s just very special for me that mom takes me all the way over there.”

Adelyn — who stands tall at 5 feet, 5 inches and is outspoken in class — had been having panic attacks in school as she approached puberty. After she started seeing the doctors in North Dallas, the attacks stopped.

But last week, the panic attacks started again when Republican Gov. — seven days before the GOP primary election in which he’s being accused of not being conservative enough — ordered state child welfare officials to into reports of transgender kids receiving .

Adelyn is terrified she will be forcibly separated from her mother. So great is her anxiety that she doesn’t want to sleep in her own bed. The Vigil family agreed to speak with The Texas Tribune but did not feel safe disclosing details about Adelyn’s medical care.

Abbott’s directive followed a from Attorney General — who is also in in Tuesday’s primary election — that said gender-affirming care constitutes child abuse.

Paxton’s opinion cited body modification surgeries that medical experts say are . But he also said it would be child abuse to administer that is widely accepted by leading health care groups, like , which are completely reversible. Under the gender-affirming model of care, experts say, more time is spent allowing kids to socially transition instead of focusing on medical treatment.

Shelly Skeen, a senior attorney with Lambda Legal, said it’s highly unlikely that a judge would justify child abuse charges or removal of a child based solely on the use of gender-affirming therapy.

“Texas law has a very clear definition of what child abuse is, and it’s not this,” Skeen said.

Still, the attorney general’s opinion and governor’s directive drew fire from families, lawmakers, doctors, advocates , among others. Advocates say that calling gender-affirming therapy child abuse could lead to it being weaponized in divorce cases, create legal issues for physicians and therapists who treat transgender youth and empower people to attack the young people themselves — as well as the family members and others who support them.

“It’s not a far stretch to think that you could be harassed, assaulted, killed,” said W. Carsten Andresen, an associate professor of criminal justice at St. Edward’s University in Austin.

Child abuse investigations based on gender-affirming care are almost unheard of in Texas. Officials at the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services say that there have been three reports last week “meeting the description in the AG opinion and Governor’s directive” but offered no other details. No investigations have been launched, officials said.

But families with transgender kids and their advocates say even an attempt at criminalizing certain care further stigmatizes an already vulnerable group of Texans. The officials’ moves also can block access to treatments that can prevent suicide and severe depression caused in part by gender dysphoria — discomfort related to feeling a disconnect between one’s personal gender identity and the gender assigned at birth.

A recent study showed that more than 40% of transgender youth attempt suicide. The rate of suicide attempts among transgender youth is three times higher than among their cisgender counterparts, according to recent studies by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

And the moves now leave Texas families with transgender children choosing between getting their children health care that medical experts recommend or possibly facing a child protective services investigation.

“​​I know I have to fight. I know I have to speak up. I know I have to show up for her. But how do I alleviate her stress when I’m stressed?” Adamalis said. “The fact that she has to do the fighting, too — it’s just terrible. She had to mature so much faster than kids her age.”

Riding a wave of anti-trans politics

Abbott and Paxton have spent the past year reflecting and stoking anti-transgender sentiment among voters — many of them stirred by right-wing media. The public pressure was so intense that that specialized in helping transgender young people was formally dissolved.

In his statement this week, Abbott even to act as watchdogs and report any parents for abuse if they believe the parent is supporting their child’s gender transition with professional help.

For years, the GOP-dominated Texas Legislature has . In 2017, lawmakers unsuccessfully sought to ban people from using bathrooms that don’t match the sex they were assigned at birth. Last year, they succeeded in limiting athletic participation by transgender students. Last year during the regular legislative session, Texas than any other state legislature, according to Equality Texas, which tracks such legislation.

that would explicitly classify some gender-affirming care as child abuse. The Texas Senate passed the bill, but the legislation died in the House.

The opinion and new directive that aim to achieve the same effect without a law passing further stigmatizes an already marginalized group by normalizing speech and actions that target them, Texas House Democrats in a letter blasting the comments by Abbott and Paxton.

“Transphobic and false statements like those made by the Governor and the Attorney General have produced an unsafe environment in our state that has forced families to flee to protect their transgender kids, adversely affected the mental health of gender expansive youth, and perpetuated an epidemic of violence against transgender Texans, especially Black trans women,” the letter from several Democratic lawmakers read.

On Thursday, district attorneys from five Texas counties — including Dallas, Bexar, Harris and Travis — to bash the directives as “anti-trans” and “life-threatening” and saying they would not treat gender-affirming actions as abuse.

“We want to assure our residents with transgender children that they are safe to continue seeking the care their children need,” a joint statement said.

Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg said she “any parent, any facility, or anyone else for providing medically appropriate care to transgender children.”

“As a member of the LGBTQ community myself, I am particularly sensitive to the invidious nature of this order — it turns family members against each other at the expense of their children,” Ogg said in a statement. “It is a remnant of a hateful past that I had hoped our society had matured beyond.”

Second-guessing more care

Since Adelyn’s mother sat her down and told her about the governor’s order, the teen has been reconsidering whether she wants to go to her next doctor’s appointment. She has been scrolling through TikTok videos about the order until her mother comes home from work. On Thursday, she tried to watch a Percy Jackson movie as a distraction, but the fear has been getting to her.

“When I’m at work, she keeps calling and calling: ‘When are you going to be home and how long? How much longer? Are you almost home?’” Adamalis said. “It affects her in that sense that she wants to feel that kind of security and feel safe around me.”

Five years ago, Libby Gonzales, a transgender girl, and her family about how she never wanted to be forced into the boys’ bathroom at school, and that the idea scared her. They traveled to the Capitol to speak out against the now-infamous “bathroom bill,” which would have limited which public bathrooms transgender Texans can use. That legislation, though, died despite several attempts at getting it through the Legislature.

“I am 7 years old and I am transgender,” the nervous girl told the powerful state senators looking down at her from the dais in 2017. “Please keep me safe. Thank you.”

Today, Libby, now 11, and her family do not feel safe confirming or denying her experience with gender care anymore.

Her family — outspoken opponents of Texas Republicans’ near-constant efforts to curtail the rights of her daughter and other transgender youth — are now afraid that their efforts to support Libby will be called criminal by the most powerful men in the state.

As a result of the directive, Rachel Gonzales, Libby’s mother, has developed plans in case Texas Child Protective Services shows up at her Dallas home.

“There are so many hypotheticals that my husband and I talked through.” Gonzales said. “We have to have a plan in place. It also just helps me sleep at night.“

Skeen, the Lambda Legal attorney, said political rhetoric against transgender children is already driving families out of the state. But the Gonzales family said they are here to stay.

“My daughter is a fifth-generation Texan. We’re simply not leaving our home because of some bullies in the Texas [Legislature],” Gonzales said.

Extremely rare

While child abuse investigations of gender-affirming care are rare, there is at least one well-known example: a DFPS into the family of a transgender child over the use of gender-affirming therapy, a bitter custody battle fueled by the blogger father of a 7-year-old girl who was assigned male at birth.

In 2019, Abbott and Paxton demanded that the state’s child welfare agency whether the child’s mother was committing abuse by letting the child present as a girl. At the time, the move alarmed an already fearful community of parents of transgender children.

In that case, in which no surgical or hormonal procedures were used, child welfare officials ruled out child abuse and closed the investigation. The father, Jeff Younger, lost custody of his two children in the divorce, according to his website.

Younger is now for the Republican nomination to the Texas House in his Flower Mound district in Tuesday’s primary. He could not be reached for comment.

In their this week, Texas House Democrats said gender-affirming therapy is still legal for transgender youth and supported by medical professionals and that mandatory reporting laws had not changed.

And in spite of child welfare officials saying earlier this week that they would comply with Abbott’s orders, the Democratic lawmakers said no government agency “is obligated to comply with the directive of the Governor or enforce the false assertions made by the Attorney General.”

CPS investigations are only launched if “an allegation is reported, and if the allegation meets the of abuse or neglect,” said DFPS spokesperson Patrick Crimmins.

In general, CPS investigators who find evidence of abuse may decide to set up services for the family to remove the threat to the child or stage some other intervention. In extreme cases, they may ask for an order from a judge to either temporarily or permanently remove children from the home.

Their worst fear

Still, transgender kids Libby knows “are freaking out, coming home from school crying. I mean, she also has cried a lot,” Rachel Gonzales said. “That would cause irreparable harm to any family and any child to remove a kid from their home in a state where the government is very intentionally trying to hurt them.”

Even an investigation itself can be traumatic, life-altering and invasive, Andresen said. A may interview family members and others familiar with a family or the child in order to decide whether there is reason to believe abuse is taking place or whether to rule it out, among other possible outcomes.

“Parents that have the money and resources are seriously thinking about looking to move outside of Texas,” said Andresen, whose wife sometimes works with transgender families in her job as a family attorney. “Even if there is no legal grounds, why would you stay here with somebody threatening to investigate you?” Also, any protection under the law could be wiped away easily if Texas lawmakers — an increasingly conservative bunch — decide to change the code, which could effectively make gender-affirming therapy for minors illegal in Texas.

Adelyn’s care has “really been life-changing” for the Rio Grande Valley girl, her mother said.

“How is that considered child abuse to accept them and love them?” Adamalis Vigil asks. “How can they overstep their power and try to come and tell me how I should love my child?”

Disclosure: Equality Texas has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete .

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Julia wouldn’t describe herself as the “biggest sports person” in the world. She’s not into basketball or football. She played soccer when she was little, but it didn’t stick as she got older.

What she’s really into are sports like cross country and track, which she feels are smaller in scale and more intimate. She trained with her dad, who used to run track in high school, and soon discovered she had a knack for it.

“He taught me the form and how to run, and I just fell in love with running hurdles because I was good at it, but also, it just gave me a feeling that you don’t really feel in a lot of other situations,” she said. It feels like putting life on pause for 20 seconds or so, she added, and “you only focus on what you’re doing and how to do it right.”

It’s this feeling Julia chases when she practices — but as a transgender athlete, she hasn’t been able to pursue it in competition. Because of statewide rules, she’s essentially barred from competing against other girls.

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“The government and think that I’m good because of how I was born, but really, I’m good because I know how to do the form, and I’m good because I practice my ass off,” said Julia, a transgender girl who attends high school in Central Texas and has requested to use a pseudonym and remain anonymous to protect her privacy. “Honestly, with the leadership that we have right now and who all is in charge and making the rules, I don’t think that I’m going to be able to run.”

Last year, the Texas Legislature passed , which requires that student athletes play on sports teams that correspond to the sex listed on their birth certificate, and the certificate athletes present must have been issued near the time of birth. The law went into effect Tuesday, making to enact similar legislation.

Supporters of the law argue it is necessary to State Rep. , R-Spring, said one of her main reasons for authoring the bill was to “protect girls’ safety.” She did not respond to requests for comment for this story, but , she hinted at introducing future legislation that would expand sports team restrictions to the college level.

“We have got to come back and protect our college girls in the next session,” she said.

HB 25 targets transgender youth, a rather small slice of the state’s population. , and it’s predicted the number of transgender youth is even smaller.

Nevertheless, legislation targeting trans people has been in recent years. Lt. Gov. said Tuesday that he was “especially proud” of the law.

“In Texas, we refuse to deny any woman or girl athlete the right to compete on a level playing field, and to be the best in their sport,” Patrick .

LGBTQ advocates say there’s been little evidence in the state of Texas to support the argument that transgender girls would displace cisgender girls on sports teams.

The transgender sports bill was part of a litany of anti-trans legislation introduced last year during Texas’ four legislative sessions that pushed and has led to on LGBTQ youth, said Ricardo Martinez, executive director of Equality Texas, a statewide advocacy organization for LGBTQ Texans.

“Lawmakers have willingly ignored the overwhelming harm that this bill and bills like it has already caused in favor of exploiting our differences and the lack of familiarity that some people may have about transgender people,” Martinez said. “This we know stokes fear, and it divides us.”

Advocates for transgender youth say they are bracing for the impact of the law’s implementation and the heightened scrutiny of transgender youth and their bodies. School districts have said they will abide by the law, but it’s still unclear how that will look in practice and how schools will determine whether a student’s birth certificate was issued near the time of birth.

Julia, 16, said she’s been able to practice with the girls team at her school during track season, but she doesn’t compete in meets. For her, the law means she has to face a “harsh truth” — competing in a sport she loves is something she just won’t be able to do.

“I wish I had that sort of idea in my head that this practice would all lead to something,” she said. “Now after actually realizing that this law is being put into place … all the practice that I’m going to be doing is going to lead up to nothing because I don’t have anywhere to show it off or anywhere to compete.”

Staying in compliance

Although some Republican lawmakers have said the new law codifies existing rules from the University Interscholastic League, the athletic governing body for public schools in Texas, the law goes further than previous UIL rules. UIL used to allow students to submit legally modified birth certificates, which students may have changed to align with their gender identity.

establishing that an athlete’s gender would be officially determined by their birth certificate. Under the new law, a modified birth certificate would only be accepted if it was changed to correct a clerical error.

Julia, who’s in the process of getting her gender marker changed on her birth certificate, said she had been optimistic that a new birth certificate would allow her to compete with other girls.

Jamey Harrison, deputy director of UIL, said school districts will be responsible for ensuring they are in compliance with the law, but it’s not completely clear whether they will be able to determine if a birth certificate is original.

“It’s new ground, so some of it will be learning as we go,” Harrison said in an interview with The Texas Tribune. “But UIL does not have an investigative arm outside of its member school committees. We don’t have a bunch of black Suburbans and earpieces and guys going around checking birth certificates, that’s not the way it works. At the end of the day, the schools are going to have to do the best they can to make sure they’re in compliance with the law.”

Harrison said if districts don’t comply with the law, they will be subject to certain sanctions and will have to forfeit competition at a minimum.

The Tribune contacted some of the state’s largest school districts in major metro and surrounding areas to ask them about their plans to comply with the law. Several school districts did not respond to requests for comment, and a handful declined to be interviewed.

Deanne Hullender, a spokesperson with the Hurst-Euless-Bedford Independent School District, said it “will definitely be following all UIL guidelines and policies provided within this new legislation.” Meghan Cone, a spokesperson for Frisco ISD, said operations in her district are not expected to change because the bill “primarily codifies existing UIL regulation.”

Enforcement of laws similar to HB 25 have been halted in states like and as litigation battles over the statutes play out in court. A lawsuit in is also challenging that state’s version of the law.

Shelly Skeen, a senior attorney with Lambda Legal, a national legal organization in support of civil rights for LGBTQ individuals, said the Texas law “certainly brings up questions about equal protection and civil rights.”

“If you’re going to treat one set of students differently than another, then you’re looking, at least in this case, [at] a violation of equal protection, but it’s also sex discrimination,” Skeen said.

According to the , current interpretation of Title IX — a federal civil rights law that prohibits discrimination based on the basis of sex in education — also encompasses gender identity and sexual orientation protections.

Andrea Segovia, senior policy and field strategist with the Transgender Education Network of Texas, said her organization is focusing on supporting transgender students as the law takes effect by making sure they are connected to mental health resources and helping educators find the best ways to be allies to LGBTQ youth.

“Unfortunately, we are at a point where it’s like a little bit of wait and see,” Segovia said about the law’s enforcement. “Because we know that UIL affects all public schools, but just like any other law in this state, it really depends on how they enforce it.”

Small group, big impact

Transgender people represent a small fraction of the state’s population, and the population of transgender youth ages 13 to 17 is estimated to be about 13,800, or about 0.7% of teens within that age range, . However, Texas is one of the states with the most transgender youths aside from California, Florida and New York.

Harrison said UIL doesn’t keep data on the number of K-12 transgender athletes that participate in school sports.

According to the Trevor Project, a national suicide prevention and crisis intervention organization for LGBTQ youth, about . Transgender youth are less likely to compete compared with their lesbian, gay and bisexual peers, said Casey Pick, Trevor Project’s senior fellow for advocacy and government affairs.

“Many of these youth tell us that they didn’t participate in sports because of fear of harassment discrimination, so that is a reality,” Pick said. “But some of the youth who do participate tell us that it is their one source of relaxation, their place to find camaraderie and teamwork, that they have a lot of fun and sometimes it’s the place they feel best about their bodies and who they are.”

Another worry among opponents of the Texas law is the effect it could have on cisgender women who don’t subscribe to traditional interpretations of what a young girl or woman should look like.

Lis Riley, whose child is a cisgender girl who plays basketball in Austin ISD, said her daughter used to present herself as masculine before but has started to lean back into a feminine identity so she’s not targeted while participating in sports.

“‘I need to kind of look like a girl so people don’t look at me weird when I’m trying out for the girls basketball team,’ essentially is kind of what she’s telling me, which is kind of sad to feel like that’s the world of high school sports in a public school,” Riley said.

Meanwhile, student athletes like Julia are left with virtually no choices if they want to compete.

During the offseason, Julia said she’s been practicing by running around her neighborhood and sometimes going to her school’s track. Her coaches have applauded her talent, she said, but she’s made it clear to them that the only team she feels comfortable being a part of and competing with is the girls track team.

“I don’t see it as a ‘me’ problem. I see it as other people’s problem,” she said of the Texas law. “I kind of accepted that I’m not gonna be able to [compete]. I kind of just deal with it. I mean, it sucks, but that’s kind of the harsh reality.”

“” was first published by The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.

For LGBTQ mental health support, call the Trevor Project’s 24/7 at 866-488-7386. You can also reach a trained crisis counselor through the by calling 800-273-8255 or texting 741741.

Disclosure: Equality Texas has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete .

They’ve either rejected the Virginia Department of Education model policy outright or are adopting standards that fall short of the department’s guidelines.

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In October, VPM reported that only two divisions in central Virginia have adopted policies that are with the model. And at least six school boards, including Augusta, Bedford and Pittsylvania counties, have voted to explicitly reject the policy, according to tracking by Equality Virginia, an advocacy organization for the LGBTQ community.

“It really does have me scratching my head because these school boards need to be in compliance with state and federal law,” said Equality Virginia Executive Director Vee Lamneck. “And that’s what this guidance really helps school boards do.” The document lays out detailed steps for addressing the rights of students, from maintaining privacy about their transgender status (including from their parents, in the case of nonsupportive families) to developing gender neutral dress codes and allowing them to use the restrooms and locker rooms that align with their gender identities.  

Beyond the fact that many districts aren’t following with the law, there also appears to be little, if any, enforcement. This summer, James Lane, the state’s superintendent of public instruction, informing divisions that they assumed “all legal responsibility for noncompliance.” But the Department of Education doesn’t have the authority to assess penalties or otherwise pressure local boards to adopt consistent policies (the department isn’t even tracking which divisions are meeting the standards, according to spokesperson Ken Blackstone).

During a, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe and Republican Glenn Youngkin both signaled that local school boards should have a large role in shaping policies on the treatment of transgender students.

“I’ve always felt that school boards have the pulse of the local community, they should be making their decisions,” McAuliffe said . He doubled down later that month, repeating in another debate that “” should have input on the issue (though the state “will always issue guidance,” he said).

Youngkin has gone a step further, saying parents should have a voice in the “dialogue.” But , at least as written, largely takes local choice out of the equation, requiring school boards to set policies that are consistent with — or even more comprehensive than — drafted by the Virginia Department of Education. The document offers specific recommendations on a wide range of policies, from using the names and pronouns students identify with to allowing them to use the restrooms that align with their gender identities.

Jack Preis, an associate dean with the University of Richmond School of Law, said the state attorney general does have the authority to proactively enforce state law. But it doesn’t appear that Attorney General Mark Herring is taking those steps. After the legislation was unsuccessfully challenged by conservative groups, one attorney with his office said the state would not withhold funding to divisions that failed to comply with the law, by Courthouse News Service.

“I think DOE would be the best folks to talk to about how they implement and enforce their guidance and policies,” spokesperson Charlotte Gomer wrote in response to questions from the Mercury. 

The attorney general, she said, “believes that all students in Virginia deserve a safe, welcoming learning environment where they feel supported and protected, and adopting DOE’s guidance or something similar will help with that goal.” But Gomer didn’t respond to additional follow-up questions about whether there were any plans for enforcement, or whether there were any potential mechanisms to drive compliance beyond withholding state funding.

With no incentives — negative or positive — for following the law, its impact and its future remain uncertain. Neither Youngkin nor McAuliffe have addressed whether their positions on local control mean they would support its repeal. Nor did they comment on whether local school boards should be required to follow VDOE guidelines. The Youngkin campaign did not respond to a request for comment, and McAuliffe spokesperson Renzo Olivari said only that the former governor “has been clear he will always protect students from discrimination.”

The issue has become especially resonant, though, amid a heated race that’s focused more on . Public education has been a dominant emphasis for both campaigns, with Youngkin billing himself as a and McAuliffe accusing him of ginning up a “right-wing culture war.”

Glenn Youngkin wants to bring Donald Trump’s politics of hate and divisiveness to our Commonwealth and to our classrooms. If we come together, we can stop him. Get out and vote.

— Terry McAuliffe (@TerryMcAuliffe)

Amid the debates, policies regarding transgender students have become as big a flashpoint as the ongoing outrage against so-called critical race theory — a largely academic term that’s been leveraged to criticize school equity efforts and lessons that incorporate historical racism. Earlier this year, there were arrests at a Loudoun County school board meeting where opponents the district’s proposed transgender rights policy. The policy, which was ultimately passed by the board, again became politicized when the district was accused of committed against a student in the girls’ bathroom of a local high school (the parents of the victim have claimed the perpetrator was was gender fluid, but no discussion of the perpetrator’s gender identity surfaced in the court hearing, ).

 Other boards have made headlines for or .

“It’s probably fair to say that some hesitation or resistance does come from pushback from parents and families who don’t want to see these policies adopted,” Lamneck said. But, they added, it can also stem from basic unfamiliarity with transgender people and the challenges they face.

Despite efforts by state legislators to move in the direction of more progessive school policies, Preis said there’s still hesitation from many school boards — and families — about issues like inclusive bathrooms and locker rooms. That’s despite the fact that denying students access to facilities that align with their gender identities has been interpreted as a violation of constitutional rights — largely through a court case brought by former Virginia public school student .

“I try to be honest about the fact that a lot of reasonable people are unaware and still learning about these things for the first time,” Preis said. Some local administrators also say the model policy doesn’t always match up with the needs or values of their school community. Keith Perrigan, the superintendent for Bristol City Public Schools in Southwest Virginia, emphasized that his district has “by no means” adopted the state’s guidelines, instead opting for a more general that includes gender identity as a protected status.

It’s a route many local divisions have taken, according to VPM, and one that the Virginia School Boards Association says legally meets the requirements of the state’s law (JT Kessler, the association’s government relations specialist, did not respond to a request for comment). Del. Marcus Simon, D-Fairfax, who sponsored the original legislation, also said legislators were aware that the language offered few options for enforcement.

“We did know that should a school district basically give us the middle finger, there isn’t a whole lot to be done about it,” he said. “But the intensity of the backlash, and the decision to use this as a wedge issue, has been disappointing.” Without specific language to address compliance, Preis said the law is likely to be fought out in the courts system through individual lawsuits against nonconforming school districts.

The problem, Lamneck said, is that it shifts the burden onto already vulnerable students and their families. And beyond the hassle of fighting their school districts, they said it impacts student safety and wellbeing. General nondiscrimination policies don’t address many of the day-to-day challenges transgender students can face, like what to do if a classmate or teacher refuses to use the name or pronouns they identify with.

“It’s important for school boards to be in compliance with state and federal law, but we’re really talking about the quality of these kids’ lives,” Lamneck said. The failure to address enforcement could also have an impact on other recently passed legislation. 

Earlier this year, state lawmakers passed a bill to require for all licensed school employees. The legislation again tasked VDOE with drafting guidance for school districts, but individual divisions are responsible for adopting and implementing their own training policies. Given the current climate surrounding critical race theory, it could become another political flashpoint for localities.

“The question really is, ‘Are we going to be entering another era of mass resistance for some of these localities?’” Simon said. “Which is the way I look at it. And if we are, if school boards have gotten so politicized, then we’ll have to look at what other tools are available other than passing laws and expecting government officials to follow them.”

This article originally appeared at the part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Virginia Mercury maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Robert Zullo for questions: info@virginiamercury.com. Follow Virginia Mercury on and .

The legislation is now primed to become law, after the state Senate voted 19-12 on Friday to pass , authored by state Rep. , R-Spring, and the House voted to concur on Sunday. The Senate floor vote followed a swiftly held committee meeting where a 24-hour notice rule was suspended and the Senate’s Health and Human Services Committee voted to advance the legislation. Under HB 25, students would only be permitted to compete on sports teams that correspond to the gender listed on their birth certificate that was assigned at or near the time of birth.

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Friday’s vote is the fifth time this year the Senate has passed legislation targeting transgender youth participation in school sports. Abbott and Lt. Gov. have pushed for the legislation during this year’s sessions. With HB 25 advancing, Texas joins at least five other states that have passed such legislation.

Critics of the legislation, including transgender advocates, say it unfairly targets transgender children and puts them and cisgender children at risk for being discriminated against.

Getting the bill through the House proved to be a major hurdle for lawmakers this year after legislation faltered in the lower chamber during the regular session and two subsequent special sessions, which included a .

The birth certificate requirement under HB 25 goes further than rules from University Interscholastic League, which governs public school sports in Texas. According to UIL rules, , though the governing body also accepts birth certificates that were modified to match a student’s gender identity. UIL has said the process for checking birth certificates is left up to schools and districts.

HB 25 would disallow acceptance of modified birth certificates by requiring a student’s gender to be determined by their original birth certificate unless their original certificate contained a clerical error. However, the process for how a birth certificate will be checked for whether it has been legally modified is unclear.

An amendment was added in the House, but later removed in the Senate, to the legislation that defined “biological sex” as “the physical condition of being male or female as determined by the sex organs, chromosomes, and endogenous profile of the individual at birth.” Another House amendment ensures the legislation complies with state and federal laws related to the confidentiality of student medical information.

Swanson has said that the intention of HB 25 is to “protect the right to fair competition in sports” for women and girls and uphold Title IX, a federal law that prohibits education institutions that receive federal funds from discriminating on the basis of sex.

State Sen. , R-Lubbock, who authored similar legislation this special session, said during a news conference in support of HB 25 that passage of the bill had “been a long time coming.”

“A lot of times we say bills are transformational. This is actually one that drew the line in the sand: that biological females should stay with biological females and biological males should stay with biological males.”

During the House floor debate on HB 25, Democrats said legislators should think about the mental burden such legislation would have on transgender children who already predisposed to bullying and thoughts of suicide.

“This [bill] is not about girls’ sports, this is about trying to police people and their behavior and their gender expression,” said state Rep. , D-Driftwood, secretary of the Texas House LGBTQ Caucus.

Major employers within the state have also signaled their opposition to the law, with about 70 employers and investors signing on to a letter from the coalition Texas Competes, speaking out against restrictive state policies that target LGBTQ people.

In the past year, more than half of transgender and nonbinary youth in the U.S. have seriously considered suicide, and 1 in 5 have attempted suicide, according to The Trevor Project’s . More than 90% of LGBTQ Youth reported that recent politics have negatively impacted their mental health.

Ricardo Martinez, CEO of Equality Texas, an organization that advocates for LGBTQ Texans, said in a statement that HB 25 tells transgender children “that Texas is not a safe place for them to live.”

“Transgender kids, adults, and their families are not political collateral,” Martinez said. “They deserve every fundamental right and opportunity that all other Texans have.”

This article originally appeared at . Disclosure: Equality Texas has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete .

For LGBTQ mental health support, call the Trevor Project’s 24/7 at 866-488-7386. You can also call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-8255 or text 741741 from anywhere in the country to reach a trained crisis counselor. Read our for more information.

After more than eight hours of emotional testimony, the House Select Committee on Constitutional Rights and Remedies voted 8-4 along party lines to advance . The legislation, authored by state Rep. , R-Spring, would restrict student athletes at public schools to playing on sports teams that correspond with the sex listed on their birth certificate at or near their time of birth.

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Lawmakers’ attempts to enshrine such restrictions into law have failed three previous times this year. But Wednesday’s committee vote helped the legislation clear a key hurdle that increases its likelihood of becoming law this time.

Republican lawmakers have portrayed the legislation as a way to protect cisgender women’s rights under Title IX, a federal law that restricts discrimination on the basis of sex in educational settings. Proponents of HB 25 have claimed that transgender girls’ participation on teams made up of mostly cisgender girls would present safety hazards for cisgender girls and prevent them from obtaining athletic scholarships. Medical professionals have largely debunked arguments that transgender athletes who are taking hormones have an advantage, with showing people taking hormones did not have a significant performance edge in distance running.

“Our constituents expect us to see problems that are coming, and not wait till there’s a disaster till everything falls apart and try to fix it,” Swanson said. “We don’t have to wait till it’s a big problem in Texas.”

Democrats and other opponents of the legislation questioned what problem lawmakers are trying to solve and pointed out how bills targeting transgender children . Numerous parents of transgender youth testified before the House committee Wednesday, including Amber Briggle, the mother of a 13-year-old transgender boy. Briggle said she was “mad as hell” for having to show up to the legislature again to combat a bill that targets her child.

“He’s 13, he shouldn’t have to deal with that,” Briggle said. “I want him to go to gymnastics. I want to go to taekwondo. I want him to do well in school, and I don’t want to have him worry about this because I saw how much it harmed him in April and May.”

Aaron Richie, father of two transgender teenagers, said his kids have dreaded the start of legislative sessions “in anticipation of the bills that are going to debate what rights and opportunities they should have.”

The University Interscholastic League, which governs public school sports in Texas, already requires that an athlete’s gender be . (Two private schools are also part of UIL, according to UIL deputy director Jamey Harrison.) However, UIL also accepts legally modified birth certificates, on which students may have had their gender officially changed to align with their gender identity.

“We’re just strictly codifying UIL rules,” Swanson said while presenting HB 25 to House committee members.

But if HB 25 should become law, it would no longer allow for the acceptance of legally modified birth certificates. In a statement, UIL spokesperson Julia Atkins said the process for checking student birth certificates is left up to schools, not the UIL.

Leal Anderson, the athletic director for the Austin Independent School District, said in an interview he doesn’t have any information on instances in his district of a transgender student playing on a team corresponding with their gender identity.

“I would say that normally [birth certificates are] checked but then it’d be double checked if there’s a question, but in most cases there’s not a question of the identity of the gender of the person,” Anderson said.

Opponents of the bill have said it addresses a problem that does not currently exist.

Rep. , D-Houston, was critical of the bill, saying that a study had not been done to give lawmakers more comprehensive research on transgender student athletes in Texas.

“I just want to make sure we have done enough. I don’t want to see kids demonized,” she said. “These children have gone through a lot. The parents have been here several times during the session, and they have gone through a lot. I’m a parent, and at some point in time you feel like you’re tired of your kids getting picked [on].”

State Rep. , D-El Paso, discussed a potential amendment that would requirie a more in-depth look at transgender students’ participation in school sports. That possible amendment could come up when the bill reaches the full House.

Support for transgender athlete legislation differs across partisan lines in the U.S. , about 62% of Democrats and 9% of Republicans “favor or strongly favor” transgender girls playing on sports teams with cisgender girls. This year, at least five states signed into law legislation that would restrict transgender athletes from participating in sports.

During multiple legislative sessions this year, the Texas Legislature has introduced other bills targeting transgender youth, such as legislation that would limit for children and the care as child abuse.

The legislation advanced Wednesday is similar to , which passed in the Senate. But the upper chamber’s bill was assigned to the House Public Education Committee, in which legislators have yet to hold a hearing on the bill.

During the regular legislative session, that education committee passed legislation targeting transgender youth participation in sports, but it died in the full House after . In a subsequent special session, a Democratic walkout prevented the House from even taking up legislation. And during the second special session, state Rep. , D-Houston, chair of the House Public Education Committee, from moving to the House floor.

With HB 25 advanced by the Select Committee on Constitutional Rights and Remedies, it now heads to the full chamber. House Speaker has said that the House would have . More than half of House members have signed on as coauthors of similar legislation introduced in previous sessions. If the bill passes the lower chamber, it will then head to the Senate, which is likely to approve it.

, Lt. Gov. said he would continue to push for the transgender sports bill until it becomes law.

The introduction of such laws have taken and . , The Trevor Project, a suicide prevention and crisis intervention organization for LGBTQ youth, said it has received almost 11,000 crisis contacts from LGBTQ Texans, a 150% increase from the same time period last year. According to the organization’s 2021 National Survey on LGBTQ Youth Mental Health, more than half of transgender and nonbinary youth “seriously considered suicide in the past year and 1 in 5 attempted suicide.”

Business leaders have also been critical of anti-LGBTQ legislation. René Lara, legislative director for Texas AFL-CIO, testified against HB 25, saying the legislature is not prioritizing more important matters such as labor shortage complaints stemming from the pandemic.

Texas Competes, a coalition of almost 1,500 business organizations, saying that it was against legislation that targets the LGBTQ community. About 70 major employers signed on to the letter, including Amazon, Dell Technologies and Microsoft.

Jessica Shortall, managing director of Texas Competes, said some companies are concerned that legislation targeting LGBTQ Texans presents the state as unwelcoming to potential residents.

“We have folks that are really concerned about young talent — millennial and zoomer talent — who [are] overwhelmingly supportive, much more even than their older peers, of LGBTQ people,” Shortall said in an interview.

A handful of transgender children also testified on Wednesday, with some commenting on how they missed school to make a trip to the Capitol. Maya Stanton, a 10-year-old transgender girl, said she quit gymnastics after she learned a local sports association wouldn’t allow her to compete with cisgender girls. Currently, Maya is on a coed swim team, but she said she still wishes she’d had the chance to compete in gymnastics on the team of her choice.

“I have a trampoline in my backyard, and I still do gymnastics and practice my skills every day,” Maya said. “I wish I could do it with a team instead of myself. I deserve to be able to play sports, but if I had to play [on] a boys team I would quit.”

This article , the only member-supported, digital-first, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues. 

For LGBTQ mental health support, call the Trevor Project’s 24/7 at 866-488-7386. You can also call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-8255 or text 741741 from anywhere in the country to reach a trained crisis counselor. Read our for more information. 

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Legislation that would limit transgender students’ participation in school sports advanced out of a Senate committee on Monday after similar legislation during the regular session.

With no Democratic members present after dozens of , in an attempt to halt GOP-backed , six Republicans on the Senate Health and Human Services Committee still had a quorum and held their first public hearing on two bills during the days-old special legislative session. Gov. added the issue to lawmakers’ agenda when he called the special session.

Sen. , R-Lubbock, who is also vice chair of the committee and who authored and , said the bills would protect cisgender women’s rights to compete in their desired sports.

Both of the bills would require student athletes to participate on sports teams that correspond with the student’s sex assigned at birth or listed on their official birth certificate at or near the time of birth. SB 32 would impact sports at K-12 public schools, while SB 2 covers both K-12 and public colleges and universities.

“It reminds us that it’s not OK to destroy the dreams of one for the benefit of another,” Perry said during the committee hearing, arguing that transgender boys and men could take opportunities away from cisgender girls and women.

Advocates for transgender athletes and other opponents of the bill argued that there was little evidence that transgender athletes were joining sports teams.

Maddox Hilgers, who identifies as nonbinary and is a graduate student at the University of Houston, implored the committee to halt the legislation.

“This argument that transgender athletes will take over women’s sports is ridiculous, because there just not enough transgender girls to do that,” Hilgers said.

The University Interscholastic League of Texas — which oversees and governs high school athletics in Texas — currently requires the gender of students be “determined based on a student’s birth certificate.”

But the UIL recognizes changes made to a student’s birth certificate, including when a transgender person has the gender on their birth certificate changed to correspond with their gender identity, said Jamey Harrison, the UIL deputy director. But SB 2 and SB 32 would no longer allow that.

During the regular legislative session, Lt. Gov. made similar legislation a priority, with sailing through the Senate chamber. The bill ultimately died after the House for passing all Senate bills in the lower chamber.

Cassie Villela of San Antonio was one of many parents with transgender children who showed up again on Monday after testifying before the Legislature during the regular session. Bills considered earlier this year — but that were not part of Monday’s committee hearing — sought to restrict or punish transition-related health care, like puberty blockers, for children.

“My husband and I are just doing our best to give my daughter the support that she needs,” Villela told the senators while testifying against the sports bills. “We struggled for the last few years to figure out what that looks like.”

Villela said her 7-year-old daughter, who is trangender, already has a difficult road navigating obstacles such as discrimination “without having to justify her existence to the Texas Legislature.”

Villella said she came to the Capitol more than five times during the regular session to testify and talk with legislators individually about bills affecting transgender youth.

“I think they don’t see people’s lived experiences with it, the reality of it,” Villela said.

Allyson Waller is a reporter , the only member-supported, digital-first, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.

Disclosure: University of Houston has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete .

Transgender students would be banned from competing on school sports teams based on their gender identity under a bill that passed the Texas Senate on Thursday.

Despite immense , the upper chamber voted on an 18-12 vote to advance . The measure now heads to the Texas House.

The proposal would prohibit students from participating in a sport “that is designated for the biological sex opposite to the student’s biological sex as determined at the student’s birth.” Students would be required to prove their “biological sex” by showing their original, unamended birth certificates.

State Sen. , R-Lubbock, argued on Wednesday that the prohibition is necessary to keep girls safe from injury and to retain fairness in interscholastic athletics. But Perry acknowledged that he doesn’t know of any transgender students currently competing in Texas school sports.

And medical professionals have largely debunked the argument that transgender athletes have an advantage, with showing people taking hormones did not have a significant performance edge in distance running.

Opponents said the Republican leadership-backed bill was a “fear tactic” in search of a problem that doesn’t exist.

“Trans kids, they just know they are not what their birth certificate says,” said state Sen. , D-San Antonio. “And that’s where we’re creating a problem that we don’t need to.”

The measure would codify existing school athletic policy. The University Interscholastic League of Texas, which governs high school athletics and extracurricular activities, currently relies on students’ birth certificates to determine whether they participate in men’s or women’s athletics. Notably, the UIL recognizes changes made to birth certificates to alter a student’s gender marker, though that would no longer be allowed under the proposal.

Both the NCAA, the governing body for college athletics, and the International Olympic Committee allow athletes to compete based on their gender identity.

State Sen. , D-Dallas, suggested that if lawmakers were truly concerned with player safety, they’d focus on legislating injury-prone contact sports such as football. He also worried that the proposal could be harmful to cisgender or nonbinary students whose gender expressions don’t align with traditional social constructs. And he questioned whether his colleagues were trying to legislate a situation that isn’t widespread.

“I think we spend a lot of time anticipating things that aren’t going to happen,” Johnson said. “If this becomes a real problem, there might be a more subtle way we can handle it.”

Wednesday afternoon, Equality Texas held a news conference outside the Capitol building in Austin to bring awareness to over 30 bills filed in the legislature that would discriminate against LGBTQ youth. Ricardo Martinez, the organization’s CEO, noted that the first of these anti-trans bills was filed 156 days ago, on the first day of bill filing for this session.

“That day kicked off the Texas portion of a nationally-coordinated attack on our community,” Martinez said. “This attack, which intentionally targets transgender and intersex youth, who are some of the most vulnerable members of our community, is especially cruel given that we’re still in a deadly pandemic.”

Landon Richie, an 18-year-old transgender Texan, skipped his classes at the University of Houston to speak outside the Capitol Wednesday.

“Trans kids belong in Texas and deserve the same rights, access to health care, access to sports, access to public facilities, as any other Texan,” Richie said.

Mack Beggs, a transgender athlete from Texas, garnered national headlines after he in 2017 and 2018. Beggs competed in the women’s division because the UIL ruled he had to compete against the gender that appeared on his birth certificate. Attorney Jim Baudhuin sued the UIL in 2017, arguing that Beggs posed an injury risk to other athletes and possessed an unfair advantage. A Travis County judge the case.

“Mentally, it took a toll on me,” Beggs last month. “I think we need to have resources in place for other [trans] kids who are in those positions.”

He spoke out against proposals like SB 29, calling them “revolting and honestly appalling.”

The move by the Texas Senate is part of a national push by conservatives to restrict rights for transgender students. Similar bills have been filed in at least 20 states. Three states — Arkansas, Mississippi and Tennessee — earlier this year signed the prohibition into law.

Idaho was the first state to pass a law seeking to block transgender youth from sports last March. The law has been and has been blocked by a federal judge as the legal challenge proceeds through the courts.

On Monday, the that it will only hold college championships in states where transgender student-athletes can participate without discrimination.

“Inclusion and fairness can coexist for all student-athletes, including transgender athletes, at all levels of sport,” the NCAA statement said. “Our clear expectation as the Association’s top governing body is that all student-athletes will be treated with dignity and respect. We are committed to ensuring that NCAA championships are open for all who earn the right to compete in them.”

Multiple games in the 2022 NCAA men’s March Madness tournament are already scheduled to be played in Fort Worth and San Antonio and the 2024 college football national championship is slated for NRG Stadium in Houston.

Disclosure: Equality Texas and University of Houston have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete .

Shawn Mulcahy is a reporting fellow at , the only member-supported, digital-first, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.