Trump administration says Jeffco’s transgender-inclusive school policies violate Title IX

The Trump administration says several Jeffco Public Schools policies accommodating transgender students violate Title IX. 

The U.S. Department of Education initiated an investigation in June into the district’s policies allowing transgender students to share accommodations with students who match their gender identity on overnight trips. 

In a press release Friday, the department said the district violated Title IX, the federal law that prohibits sex-based discrimination by schools that receive federal funds, by allowing transgender students to “access female bathrooms, locker rooms, and overnight accommodations, and to compete in female sports.”

The district’s policies are in line with the Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act. A statement from Jeffco Public Schools said the department’s conclusion is erroneous, and implementing its proposed agreement would put the school district “in direct conflict with Colorado law.”

“Providing equal access to programs and services for all Jeffco students, including those who are transgender, does not violate Title IX,” the statement said. “The Department’s interpretation has no basis in the Title IX regulations and is not supported by any binding court decision.”

The Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights said the district can “voluntarily resolve” its violations or risk “imminent enforcement action.” The district would need to rescind policies that allow transgender students to access female facilities and compete in female sports and issue a public statement about changing its policies. 

Republicans and the Trump administration have repeatedly used Title IX as a basis to discriminate against transgender students. 

District policy says sleeping arrangements for overnight school trips are determined on a case-by-case basis while maximizing social integration, minimizing stigma, providing equal opportunity and ensuring safety and comfort for transgender students. Transgender students under no circumstance would be required to share a room with students whose gender identity conflicts with their own, the policy says. 

In August, a federal judge dismissed a lawsuit from parents looking to block the policy. Parents claimed their child was assigned to sleep in the same bed as a transgender student on a 2023 school trip, but the district said students never shared beds on the trip. It also did not know the student in question was transgender because she “enrolled for the trip as a female, consistent with her school enrollment and gender identity as expressed there for several years.”

The 2023 trip is what prompted the federal investigation. 

The judge in that case said that parents’ right to direct the upbringing of their child does not allow them to control public school policies. The district said the Department of Education’s interpretation is in direct conflict with the court’s ruling, as well as previous federal administrations’ interpretation of Title IX. 

As the district considers next steps, it will continue to comply with the law and “center decisions on providing exemplary, equitable educational opportunities for all students.”