This week, the U.S. Departments of Education and Health and Human Services announced that they are pursuing enforcement action against the Minnesota Department of Education and the Minnesota State High School League for continued non-compliance with Title IX. For context, the two entities maintain policies which allow males to participate in women’s sports and to use women’s facilities. Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, however, prevents discrimination on the basis of sex, so critics of these policies argue that expanding the definition of “sex” under Title IX to include “gender identity” is a betrayal of the spirit of the amendment, and often culminates in discrimination against women and girls. Despite proposed resolution agreements that would have brought the Minnesota entities into compliance, they have so far refused to modify their policies.
An investigation conducted by the Education Department’s Student Privacy Office (SPPO) has determined that California’s Department of Education is in continued violation of the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) for promoting policies which withhold information about student’s “gender identities” from parents. “SPPO concluded that certain California Department of Education (CDE) policies and practices create powerful state-directed pressure for schools to adopt policies that have led to FERPA noncompliance. Instead of ensuring compliance with FERPA as a recipient of Federal funding, California state laws, guidance, and legal actions – such as AB 1955, which prohibits schools from requiring parents to be informed of their child’s ‘gender transition’ – have effectively coerced districts to withhold information from parents in violation of FERPA” the DOE’s press release reads. The Student Privacy Office has offered the CDE an opportunity to voluntarily resolve its violations, but despite repeated warnings, the CDE has yet to comply with outreach by the SPPO.
Florida lawmakers have introduced bills that would modify the state’s existing legal prohibitions against pediatric medical transition procedures for dysphoric minors. The bills would introduce “aiding and abetting” language to the current law (a felony charge) and empower the state attorney general to investigate and sue violators. The Bills’ sponsors have maintained that the new provisions would help to strengthen the law and prevent work arounds from “bad faith” actors. “What we’re seeing is there’s coding that’s actually being used that is becoming the problem, and hundreds of thousands of dollars is spent per child for them to transition, and codes are being misrepresented...” Rep. Lauren Melo explained in a Tuesday hearing.
In the Free Press, Glenna Goldis—a lawyer who worked for New York’s Attorney General’s Office under the Bureau for consumer fraud and protection—chronicles how she was unceremoniously let go for her gender critical views. After studying the evidence for, and history of, pediatric medical transition, Goldis grew concerned that the practice—endorsed by the New York political establishment—was being implemented at scale despite a lack of strong supporting evidence. Goldis’ public statements, however, drew the ire of the AG’s office who threatened to terminate her position if she continued to engage in “disruptive public speech.” “Despite growing evidence that the practice was unsafe, the attorney general continued to side with providers of pediatric gender medicine. Her amicus briefs could have persuaded judges to protect the practice. Her press releases contributed to a feeling, among Democrats, that this topic wasn’t up for debate” Goldis explains.
After San Diego’s Rady Children’s Hospital announced it would be curtailing access to pediatric medical transition for dysphoric minors, hundreds of protesters came out last weekend to protest the hospital’s decision. Rady Children’s attributed the decision to the Trump administration’s proposed rules on sex-rejecting procedures for minors, which would prohibit Medicaid and Medicare reimbursements for GAC, and prohibit entities from rendering the procedures as a condition of receiving federal funds. Notably, Children’s Hospital of Orange County issued a similar announcement this past week.
The Society for Evidence-Based Medicine (SEGM) spotlighted an influential article by psychologist and SEGM president, Roberto D’Angelo, that argues that modern psychoanalysis’ pseudoscientific embrace of “affirming care” risks duplicating the mistakes of the past and harming “sexual and gender minorities.” D’Angelo explains that through a combination of arrogance and a desire not to stigmatize transgender identities in the way homosexuality was previously stigmatized, the field of psychoanalysis has gone all in on “affirming care.” D’Angelo shrewdly notes, however, the ways in which “gender identity” and “sexual orientation” are distinct, while rejecting the disingenuous framing that “exploratory psychotherapy” for trans-identified youth is akin to a form of “conversion therapy.” “While analysts who challenged psychoanalytic orthodoxy in relation to homosexuality received hate mail, including from prominent educators (Downey and Friedman Citation2008), those who challenge the psychoanalytic hegemony on trans face accusations of right-wing bias, transphobia and even genocidal intent” D’Angelo goes on to explain.
Last Week, Vice President JD Vance announced a planned expansion of what’s known as the “Mexico City Rule”— which prohibits recipients of foreign aid from promoting abortion—to also include promoting Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) and “gender ideology.” The policy could impact as much as $30 billion in foreign assistance, according to the New York Times. Seemingly, the new policy will have to make it through the federal rulemaking process and would not take effect immediately. “The United States is concerned that, absent this rule, U.S. taxpayer funds may support radical gender ideology and organizations engaged in harm to women and children, and further, may do so in a manner that undermines the national laws and values of sovereign nations,” one of the relevant proposed rules explains.
Spiked details how a new draft resolution—put forward by UK, Labour MP Kate Osborne—set to be voted on by the Council of Europe would help re-entrench “gender ideology” in law and policy. The resolution calls for a ban on “conversion” practices for sexual orientation, and more controversially, for “gender identity.” Moreover, the language is broad and open-ended, suggesting that it would be unlawful for therapists not to “affirm” any subjective identity claim. In effect, the law would channel many youths down a medicalization pathway, even though the majority of dysphoric youth have been known to outgrow their dysphoria by the resolution of puberty. For this reason, Faika El-Nagashi, director of European sex-based-rights initiative Athena Forum, has called the resolution a “trans-activist Trojan horse.” Notably, data from UK’s GIDS has also found that most adolescent patients were in fact same-sex attracted youth.
Joseph Figliolia
Policy Analyst
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