New York, NY; April 22, 2024—On Friday, the Biden Education Department released a new Title IX regulation to tell schools how to handle sex discrimination claims, including allegations of sexual misconduct. It was delayed multiple times since public comments opposed its gutting of due process and its redefinition of the word “sex.”
“The National Association of Scholars (NAS) denounces Biden’s Title IX rule as a due process disaster and the promotion of fringe sexual politics,” said NAS Policy Director Teresa R. Manning. “Where Title IX was slowly improving, it has now taken two steps back. Due process ought to be a prerequisite of these internal investigations which have outsized consequences on students' lives.”
Congress designed Title IX to remove impediments to women entering colleges and universities by protecting women from sex-based discrimination in higher education. NAS’s report, Dear Colleague: The Weaponization of Title IX, found that campus Title IX officers often overreached their mandates, supported by informal rules issued by the Obama and Biden administrations. These staff, who are expected to adjudicate claims of sexual misconduct and discrimination, typically represent disciplines hostile to men with no experience being fair and impartial.
The new Biden rule increases the power of campus Title IX administrators and reduces due process by allowing the “Single Investigator Model,” also called “the individual meeting method,” to resolve disputes while removing the requirement for a formal, live hearing at the college level. It also redefines “sex” to include same-sex orientation and gender ideology such that those opposed to gender ideology, transsexualism, and demanded pronouns can now be treated as violating Title IX.
“Campus activists dressed up as judge, jury, and executioner have a proven record of railroading accused students, resulting in hundreds of lawsuits against such campus kangaroo courts,” added Manning. "Incredibly, Biden’s Rule gives these bureaucrats more power and less accountability by replacing a formal hearing with ‘individual meetings.’ This reduces transparency and formality where it is needed most.”
Manning continued: “What’s more, the rule promotes fringe sexual politics by giving preferential treatment to gender ideology and those of same-sex attraction. Congress never intended Title IX to become a weapon of leftwing sexual politics. But that’s what the Biden Administration is making it.”
NAS calls on Congress to reject the Rule with its power under the Congressional Review Act. NAS also encourages state Attorneys General to sue the Education Department for this gross administrative overreach.
“Redefining ‘sex’ and gutting Due Process are matters of fundamental policy to be determined by the United States Congress, not the administrative state run amok,” concluded Manning. “NAS hopes state Attorneys General will step up and take the Biden Title IX Rule to court, stopping it well before it is scheduled to take effect on August 1.”
Photo by Jeffrey F Lin on Unsplash
