GOP senator probes 18 blue states, DC over Trump's transgender athlete order

FIRST ON FOX: A top Senate Republican is launching an investigation into over a dozen blue states over whether they're in compliance with President Donald Trump's executive order, "Keeping Men out of Women's Sports."

Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., is taking a microscope to schools across the country for alleged infractions against Trump's order, which was designed to undo several changes made under former President Joe Biden to Title IX, the decades-old law that bars sex-based discrimination in education programs and activities that receive federal funding.

His investigation is specifically targeting the inclusion of transgender athletes in girls' and women's sports, and the promotion of policies that allow shared access to facilities, like locker rooms and bathrooms.

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The scope of Cassidy's investigation is broad and includes California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, and Washington, D.C.

In 19 letters to various heads of state and collegiate education departments, Cassidy alleged that many recipients of federal funding "continue to interchangeably enroll males and females in sports teams that differ from their biological sex," and that the recipients push policies that allow shared access to facilities.

"Under the current and correct interpretation of the law, this is a clear violation of Title IX," Cassidy wrote.

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The lawmaker's investigation also comes as the Supreme Court considers a pair of cases that could have wide-ranging implications on Title IX enforcement across the country, and whether biological male athletes can participate in women's sports. 

Cassidy, who chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, noted that under Biden there were several changes and expansions to Title IX that he believed were unlawful, including changing the definition of sex to include gender identity, undermining protections for female athletes.

Trump's executive order from earlier this year changed that and returned Title IX to its 2020 version. It also ordered that the Department of Education and its Office for Civil Rights "enforce all sex-protective laws to promote the reality that there are two sexes, male and female, and that these sexes are not changeable and are grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality," Cassidy wrote.

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"As Chairman, it is my priority to ensure women and girls have every opportunity to succeed on the field and in the classroom," Cassidy said. "This means ensuring that states receiving federal financial assistance for educational programs comply with federal law and federal agency directives."

Cassidy has given the state education agencies and colleges until Dec. 8 to provide several pieces of information for his investigation, including state and institutional Title IX policies on gender identity, state laws protecting biological females, steps taken to comply with Trump's order, revisions to definitions of sex, policies on athletic participation and facility access by biological males, and complaint records, parental notifications, and disciplinary actions involving students objecting to shared spaces.