U.S.A.: California files lawsuit against DOJ over trans athlete demand

California initiated a lawsuit against the Justice Department on Monday following officials’ demands that the state’s public high schools affirm they will prohibit trans athletes from participating in girls’ sports.

The lawsuit states that the Justice Department had “no right to make such a demand” and referenced “no authority which would allow them to issue or enforce the Certification Demand Letter” to individual education agencies.

According to ‘Fox News’, California defended the challenged laws, which permit athletes to compete “consistent with” their gender identity and do not violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

The lawsuit asserts that the state’s bylaws “do not classify or discriminate based on ’biological sex,’ do not require schools to ‘depriv[e] [cisgender] female students of athletic opportunities and benefits on the basis of their sex,’ and do not effectuate any differential treatment on the basis of sex.”

“Instead, allowing athletic participation consistent with students’ gender identity is substantially related to the important government interests of affording all students the benefits of an inclusive school environment, including participation in school sports, and preventing the serious harms that transgender students would suffer from a discriminatory, exclusionary policy,” the lawsuit added.

The state has requested an injunction against the demand letter.

Last week, Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon stated in a letter obtained by Fox News Digital that public school districts must “certify in writing” by June 9 that they will not follow the California Interscholastic Federation’s gender identity rules.

“Knowingly depriving female students of athletic opportunities and benefits on the basis of their sex would constitute unconstitutional sex discrimination under the Equal Protection Clause,” Dhillon wrote.

The California Interscholastic Federation oversees public and private high school sports in the state and has a bylaw requiring its members to recognise gender identity in sports.

The bylaw states that all students should be able to participate “in a manner that is consistent with their gender identity, irrespective of the gender listed on a student’s records.”

Dhillon, a former California-based conservative attorney, stated that the certifications she seeks from public school districts will “ensure compliance” with Title IX and help them to “avoid legal liability.”

California Attorney General Rob Bonta announced that the lawsuit was filed “in anticipation of imminent legal retaliation against California’s school systems” that fail to comply with Dhillon’s demand, according to the Los Angeles Times.

“The President and his Administration are demanding that California school districts break the law and violate the Constitution — or face legal consequences. They’re demanding that our schools discriminate against the students in their care and deny their constitutionally protected rights,” Bonta said. “As we’ve proven time and again in court, just because the President disagrees with a law, that doesn’t make it any less valid.”

The Justice Department has not issued an immediate comment on the lawsuit.

Previously, the DOJ filed a lawsuit against Maine after the state repeatedly disregarded President Donald Trump’s executive order to exclude males from girls’ and women’s sports. The DOJ accused Maine of “openly and defiantly flouting federal anti-discrimination law by enforcing policies that require girls to compete against boys in athletic competitions designated exclusively for girls.”