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New York City Public Schools filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Education on Thursday over its move to cut $47 million in promised grants in response to the schools’ policies regarding transgender students.
The lawsuit asks for the reversal of the move to pull the grants.
City officials said the federal agency stripped funding without the required notice or hearing, after it concluded that school policies allowing transgender students to participate on sports teams and use bathrooms matching their gender identity rather than biological sex violate Title IX, which prohibits sex-based discrimination in education.
Last month, the Department of Education gave New York City Public Schools a Sept. 23 deadline to amend the policies or lose current and future funding for 19 specialty magnet schools.
Under the policies, “male students who identify as female or transgender are given unqualified access to female intimate spaces,” Craig Trainor, the acting assistant secretary for civil rights at the agency, said in a letter.
Several other school districts, including in Chicago and Fairfax County, Virginia, received similar letters.
The Massapequa School District implemented a policy last month prohibiting transgender students from using bathrooms and locker rooms that match their gender identities rather than biological sex.
The district said after the commissioner’s order that it will continue to offer a gender-neutral locker room and bathroom option to “any student who will be more comfortable using such a space.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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