NYC schools sue US education officials over $47M grant cuts tied to transgender policies

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New York City schools sued federal education officials Thursday over a decision to discontinue $47 million in promised grants because of the schools' guidelines supporting transgender students.

City officials said the federal agency led by Education Secretary Linda McMahon cut funding without the required notice or hearing after deciding that policies letting transgender students play sports and use bathrooms matching their gender identity violate Title IX, which forbids discrimination based on sex in education.

The Education Department, in a September letter, set a deadline for New York City Public Schools to change the policies or lose current and future funding for 19 specialty magnet schools.

The existing policies mean “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, said in a letter.

New York City was among several school districts, including Chicago and Fairfax County in Virginia, to receive such letters. New York City filed its lawsuit in federal court in Manhattan.

School officials maintain that New York City is fully compliant with Title IX and that the federal department's “novel interpretation” conflicts with state and city laws prohibiting discrimination on the basis of gender.

“U.S. DOE’s threat to cut off tens of millions of dollars in magnet funding unless we cancelled our protections for transgender and gender expansive students is contrary to federal, state, and local law and, just as importantly, our values as New York City Public Schools," Chancellor Melissa Aviles-Ramos said in a news release.

The 48-page lawsuit asks that the decision to pull the grants be reversed.

“The Department sees no merit in this lawsuit," an Education Department spokesperson responded via email.

The magnet school grant program, the statement said, "requires certification of civil rights compliance, which we could obviously not do in the face of NYC’s continued determination to violate the rights of female students under Title IX.”

In a related development, New York State Education Commissioner Betty Rosa this week ordered a school district in the suburbs of New York City to temporarily halt enforcement of its new bathroom restrictions for transgender students.

The New York Civil Liberties Union is challenging a policy the Massapequa School District imposed last month barring transgender students from using bathrooms and locker rooms that align with their gender identities.

The Long Island school district said in light of Tuesday'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.”

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Associated Press reporter Philip Marcelo in East Meadow, New York contributed to this story.