President Trump to withdraw guidance on transgender bathrooms

The Trump administration is expected to rescind guidance issued last year by President Barack Obama calling on public schools to provide transgender students with access to bathrooms that matches the gender they identify with.

The apparent decision by President Donald Trump, will be cheered by legal conservatives. But word of the move provoked intense criticism from Democrats and members of the LGBT community.

A draft proposal circulated throughout the Trump administration declared the U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Education were “withdrawing the statements of policy and guidance” issued last year by the Obama administration.

The draft said school administrators, parents and students have “struggled to understand and apply” the Obama administration guidance. But the draft also warned that “withdrawal of these guidance documents does not diminish the protections from bullying and harassment that are available to all students.

“Students must ensure that transgender students, like all students, are able to learn in a safe environment,” the draft said.

It was unclear what impact the move would have on a federal judge’s decision last year that the Highland Local School district had to allow transgender students to use the bathroom of their gender identity, as opposed to the gender of their birth.

Attorneys for the district – which includes parts of Delaware, Morrow and Knox counties – have appealed the ruling to the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Shannon Minter, legal director for the National Center for Lesbian Rights, which represents the student in the Highland case, predicted move by the Trump administration would not impact the judge’s ruling because it was based on Title IX of the 1972 education law mandating gender equality in schools and sports.

But Minter said “it sends a terrible message to transgender students that this administration doesn’t care about them or support them. The law itself still requires equal treatment. But it means the Department of Education will not take any action to help these students.”

“It’s going to create chaos and confusion and it’s going to cause more litigation,” he said. “It’s going to leave students and schools with no information about what the Department of Education thinks the law requires. It’s basically like they’re refusing to do their job.”

Dan Tierney, a spokesman for Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine, said “we don’t have a comment at this time” because “our office has not heard anything outside the media reports.

But in legal papers filed with a federal appeals court in Virginia, the Alliance Defending Freedom — which helped defend Highland schools — wrote there is a “right to bodily privacy. That right is more specifically defined in these cases as the right to use sex-specific intimate facilities free from government mandated use by a member of the opposite sex.”

White House spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters that Trump “has made it clear throughout the campaign that he is a firm believer in states’ rights and that certain issues like this are not best dealt with at the federal level.”

Although Spicer insisted that there was 100 percent agreement between the Justice Department and Education Department on rescinding last year’s guidance, published reports suggested Education Secretary Betsy DeVos opposed the move.

Chad Griffin, president of the Human Rights Campaign, called the move a “blind and cruel attack on young children,” adding that “these transgender students simply want to go to school in the morning without fear of discrimination or harassment. The consequences of this decision will no doubt be heartbreaking.”

Grant Stancliff, a spokesman for gay rights group Equality Ohio, said Trump “bragged about how he was going to help protect LGBTQ rights, and the first thing he does is repeal rights for transgender kids? They’re the most vulnerable in our community.”

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