On January 9, 2025 (with an amendment to the ruling on January 10, 2025, to correct an inadvertent omission), the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, issued an Order vacating the United States Department of Education’s (the “Department”) 2024 Title IX final rule in the litigation in which Ohio is a party. As a result, this decision directly impacts enforceability of the new rule for Ohio public school districts, who will continue to operate under the 2020 Title IX regulations.
In issuing its decision, the court reemphasized much of its reasoning from its June 2024 decision granting injunctive relief, enjoining the Department from enforcing the rule, including finding that: (1) the Department exceeded its statutory authority by extending, through rulemaking, discrimination on the basis of sex beyond discrimination on the basis of being male or female; (2) the Final Rule violates the Constitution, including by compelling and/or chilling speech; and (3) the Final Rule is arbitrary and capricious in that the Department failed to provide reasoned explanations for departing from its longstanding interpretation of Title IX and failed to account for inconsistencies that the Final Rule creates within Title IX.
The court also did not find the Department’s arguments for severance to be persuasive, finding that the three challenged provisions “fatally taint” the entire rule, and noting that it would not be proper for the court to rewrite the regulations by excising the offending material, particularly when rulemaking is the exclusive duty of the Executive Branch. As a result, as noted above, Ohio public school districts will continue to operate under the 2020 rule. If you have not recently retrained your administrators, now is a good time to think about refreshing training to ensure all individuals responsible for serving in a role in the Title IX Sexual Harassment Grievance Procedure are properly trained and district practices remain legally compliant.
For Further Information: Please feel free to reach out to any of the attorneys in Weston Hurd’s Education Law Group with any questions regarding these standards, related contract review, and/or required notices.
