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Texas judges issue additional rulings blocking Title IX revisions

Published

12 months ago

7 minute read

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton

From The Center Square

By Bethany Blankley

Rule change blocked in 15 states

Two federal judges have ruled in favor of Texas and Texas plaintiffs in separate lawsuits filed to block a Biden administration Title IX rule change from going into effect.

Texas is now the 15th state where the revisions are blocked from going into effect ahead of an Aug. 1 deadline.

Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas Amarillo Division on Friday granted the state’s request in a lawsuit filed by the state and two University of Texas at Austin professors. Kacsmaryk enjoined the U.S. Department of Education from “implementing, enacting, enforcing, or taking any action any manner to enforce” a new rule that revised Title IX pending the resolution of the case.

“The Final Rule inverts the text, history and tradition of Title IX: the statute protects women in spaces historically reserved to men; the Final Rule inserts men into spaces reserved to women,” Kacsmaryk said in his 32-page ruling.

In response, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, said, “Texas has successfully blocked Biden’s Department of Education from destroying Title IX protections for women and forcing radical ‘transgender’ ideology on Texas schools. Biden’s rule would have forced our schools to accommodate biological men on women’s sports teams and in female bathrooms, showers, and locker rooms, and required students and teachers to use incorrect pronouns. A federal judge has halted Biden’s rule pending a final ruling. It’s an honor to defend our State from Biden’s unlawful subversion of Title IX.”

Also on Friday, U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor issued a preliminary injunction against the rule in favor of Carroll Independent School District. In May, the district’s board of trustees, represented by Alliance Defending Freedom, passed a resolution denouncing the Title IX changes and sued asking the court to block it from going into effect.

Also in May, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott instructed the Texas Education Agency and Texas colleges and universities not to comply with the changes, The Center Square reported. In the last two legislative sessions, Abbott signed bills into law to strengthen student safety and “protect the integrity of women’s sports by prohibiting men from competing against female athletes.” Abbott said, “I will not let President Biden erase the advancements Texas has made.”

Judge O’Connor said in his ruling, “The compliance costs also go beyond monetary harm given the potential to infringe on constitutional rights. Privileging gender identity over biological sex is in no way authorized by the statutory text. And the consequences based on this statutory distortion appear limitless. For these reasons, and those stated by other federal courts, Carroll ISD is likely to succeed on the merits of their challenge to the final rule.”

The rulings were issued after O’Connor in June vacated a guidance issued by the DOE and the Department of Justice requiring schools to implement similar policies to the rule change before it was finalized. He also issued a permanent injunction against its enforcement in Texas, The Center Square reported.

Texas sued in June 2023 over the agencies’ mandates; the agencies are responsible for administering and enforcing Title IX.

At issue is Title IX, part of the Education Amendments Act of 1972, which states, “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.”

The law was enacted at a time when women and girls had limited athletic opportunities. Despite widespread opposition, including from women’s groups, the Biden administration began amending Title IX through several methods, arguing doing so would “advance educational equity and opportunity for women and girls across the country.”

It’s guidances and rule changes redefine biological sex to include “sexual orientation” and “gender identity.”

In response, 18 AGs argued the changes “demolished” women’s and girls’ rights, “making a mockery of Title IX’s fundamental organization principle – basic biology.”

After the Biden administration finalized the rule, multiple states sued. Texas sued on its own. Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana and Idaho filed a lawsuit. Alaska, Kansas, Utah and Wyoming filed another. Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia filed a separate lawsuit. Alabama, Florida, Georgia and South Carolina filed another.

So far, federal judges have ruled against the Biden administration.

In June, Louisiana, U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty was the first to rule against the administration, blocking the administration’s changes from going into effect in Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana and Idaho.

O’Connor also ruled against the agency Title IX mandates in June.

In Kansas, U.S. District Judge Danny Reeves blocked the rule change from going into effect in Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia.

Then in July, in Kansas, District Judge John Broomes ruled against the administration, blocking the changes from going into effect in Alaska, Kansas, Utah and Wyoming. And Judge Kacsmaryk blocked the rule from going into effect in Texas.

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No more shoes off: Trump ends TSA’s decades-old rule

International

No more shoes off: Trump ends TSA’s decades-old rule

Published on July 9, 2025

By

MXM logo MxM News

Quick Hit:

The Trump administration is phasing out one of the most despised airport security policies in America: the requirement to remove shoes during TSA screening.

Key Details:

  • Passengers will no longer be required to remove their shoes at airport security checkpoints in coming weeks.
  • The change is rolling out at Baltimore, Fort Lauderdale, Cincinnati, Portland, Philadelphia, and Piedmont Triad airports.
  • White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed the policy reversal on Tuesday morning.

Diving Deeper:

The Trump administration announced it is ending the much-loathed Transportation Security Administration rule requiring passengers to remove their shoes during security checks, a mandate that has frustrated Americans since its introduction nearly two decades ago.

The change is being implemented first at Baltimore/Washington International Airport, Fort Lauderdale International Airport, Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport, Portland International Airport, Philadelphia International Airport, and Piedmont Triad International Airport in North Carolina, according to CBS News. The policy will expand to additional airports nationwide in the coming weeks.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt shared the news on X, posting, “Big news from [the Department of Homeland Security]!” Tuesday morning. A TSA spokesman told The New York Times that “TSA and DHS are always exploring new and innovative ways to enhance the passenger experience and our strong security posture,” suggesting the policy change is part of broader improvements under President Trump’s leadership.

The policy to remove shoes was first instituted in 2006, stemming from the December 2001 attempt by Richard Reid, known as the “shoe bomber,” to ignite explosives hidden in his shoes on a flight from Paris to Miami. Reid was sentenced to life in prison after pleading guilty to terrorism charges, but critics have argued the policy punishes every American traveler for the actions of one terrorist nearly 25 years ago.

Before the update, travelers in the TSA PreCheck program were already exempt from removing shoes, belts, and jackets. Now, under President Trump’s directive to reduce pointless regulatory burdens, the policy is being eliminated for all travelers.

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Daily Caller

USAID Quietly Sent Thousands Of Viruses To Chinese Military-Linked Biolab

Published on July 9, 2025

By

 

From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Emily Kopp

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) shipped thousands of viral samples to a lab in Wuhan over the course of a 10-year program even though it had no formal agreement with the lab in place, according to previously unreported documents.

The documents show that USAID funded the exportation of 11,000 samples from Yunnan Province, where some of the closest relatives of the COVID-19 virus circulate, to Wuhan, the epicenter of the pandemic, with no apparent plan for ensuring the samples were not misdirected to bioweapons and remained accessible to the U.S. government.

A $210 million USAID public health program called PREDICT, steered by the University of California-Davis, collected viral samples in countries throughout the globe but lacked long-term storage when funding dried up, according to rudimentary plans in 2019.

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USAID’s sample dispensation plan for China is sparse: “No need [sic] information from Yunnan. They were never an official lab partner for PREDICT. All samples they helped collected [sic] are sent to, tested, and stored in Wuhan.”

The “lab” refers to the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). WIV was a close partner of USAID contractor EcoHealth Alliance and a slated partner for a PREDICT-like program supported by the State Department. The lab has poor biosafety practices and ties to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). 

One of the closest known relatives of the COVID virus is among the viruses sampled with USAID funding.

“Investigations involving USAID’s former funding of global health awards remain active and ongoing,” a senior State Department official said in a statement to the Daily Caller News Foundation. “The American people can rest assured knowing that under the Trump Administration we will not be funding these controversial programs.”

The internal documents were obtained through a FOIA lawsuit brought by U.S. Right to Know, a nonprofit newsroom and public health research group.

The shuttering of USAID – which was officially completed Tuesday – has ignited a debate about its net impact on global health. A study in The Lancet projected an association between a dropoff in USAID funding and 14 million deaths based on an epidemiological model.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement Tuesday that USAID spending has often undermined rather than strengthened American interests.

“Beyond creating a globe-spanning NGO industrial complex at taxpayer expense, USAID has little to show since the end of the Cold War,” Rubio said. “Development objectives have rarely been met, instability has often worsened, and anti-American sentiment has only grown.”

The now-defunct agency’s connection to the Wuhan lab complicates its global health legacy.

“The USAID $210 million contract for PREDICT should have included contractual terms that required all samples, or at least copies of all samples, be transferred to and stored by a US government facility,” said Rutgers University molecular biologist Richard Ebright told the DCNF. “The PREDICT grift did none of this.”

UC Davis did not respond to a request for comment. The State Department did not respond to a request for comment.

Did USAID Fund COVID’s Ancestor?

Many of the viruses stored at the lab in Wuhan may have been sampled with U.S. funding yet remain out of reach for U.S. government entities investigating the origins of COVID.

The samples were set to be preserved for testing – with human samples preserved for 10 years – the documents show. But the documents suggest that requirement was never incorporated into a formal contract with USAID.

The two scientists supervising the samples were: Ben Hu, a virologist at the WIV, who reportedly became sick with COVID-like symptoms in 2019; and Peter Daszak, a scientist who was debarred from federal funding after the U.S. government deemed him a threat to public safety for inadequate oversight of the research in Wuhan.

Hu and Daszak did not reply to requests for comment.

The documents show PREDICT contractors discussing viral samples taken from wildlife and stored in India, Liberia, Malaysia, the Republic of Congo and China. Some of the samples were stored in virus-transport media (VTM), which allows researchers to store live viruses for later use in the lab.

“It’s not rocket science to require a contract and supporting paperwork which establishes a relationship, testing protocol, and chain of custody, when one is sending out lab samples,” said Reuben Guttman, a partner at Guttman, Buschner & Brooks PLLC who specializes in ensuring the integrity of government programs, in an interview with the DCNF. “In any scientific endeavor, you need confidence in your results. That requires paperwork to prove your methodology is sound.”

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