A top Obama appointee in the Department of Education personally assured a group of LGBT activists that the White House is “aggressively engaged” in the fight to allow transgender students use whichever bathroom they please at school.
DOE Assistant Secretary for the Office of Civil Rights Catherine Lhamon delivered the good news at an LGBT summit hosted by the White House in Michigan last Thursday, where she gave the keynote address.
The event was co-sponsored by activist group Equality Michigan, which has led a statewide charge to allow schoolchildren choose their name, gender and bathroom, all without parental knowledge or input. Officials from seven different federal agencies attended the event, according to the Equality Michigan website.
Equality Michigan executive director Steph White blasted out a giddy email to supporters after the event, which she called “a great catalyst that will propel our collective work forward.” The email included an excerpt from Lhamon’s remarks, which White called “refreshingly clear.”
Speaking about the Obama administration, Lhamon told attendees: “We are serious. We are aggressively engaged. We will enforce Title IX.” The Daily Caller has filed a FOIA request with the Department of Education for Lhamon’s full remarks.
Under Lhamon’s guidance, the DOE’s Office of Civil Rights has ruled that schools will be in violation of Title IX if they do not permit transgender students to use the bathroom and locker rooms of their choice. The administration has made clear that giving private, single-user bathrooms is not a sufficient accommodation. That is: schools must allow boys who think they’re girls to shower and change alongside actual girls.
A federal appeals court upheld the Obama administration’s Title IX interpretation last week, ordering a rural Virginia school to allow a biological female to begin showering and changing alongside her male counterparts. Another Obama appointee, Judge Henry Floyd, wrote the court opinion overruling a district court that decided in favor of the school.
Lhamon, for her part, has indeed been aggressive in forcing the White House agenda onto local schools. Last November, she ordered an Illinois school district to allow a biological male to use the girls’ showers and locker rooms, threatening to pull the district’s federal funding if it didn’t comply. (The district promptly folded.)