Education Department rescinds civil-rights settlements protecting transgender students

On April 6, 2026, the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced it had rescinded six Title IX resolution agreements that prior administrations had reached with five school districts and one community college: Cape Henlopen School District (Delaware), Delaware Valley School District (Pennsylvania), Fife School District (Washington), La Mesa-Spring Valley School District and Sacramento City Unified School District (California), and Taft College (California). Those settlements had followed federal investigations that found the schools discriminated against transgender students, and they required measures such as training staff on students' pronouns and chosen names and allowing students to use facilities matching their gender identity. OCR said it would cease monitoring and enforcing the agreements effective immediately.

Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Kimberly Richey said the prior administration's agreements "distorted the plain meaning" of Title IX, framing the action as consistent with the administration's position that the statute's bar on sex discrimination does not reach gender identity. The move terminates existing, enforceable remedies for a class defined by gender identity without repealing the underlying statute — materially weakening an existing civil-rights protection — and, because it specifically strips protections benefiting transgender students, disadvantages a group on the basis of a protected characteristic.

The withdrawal of federal enforcement has already cascaded to the local level: the Delaware Valley School District, notified in February that its agreement was being terminated, has since moved to roll back its own protections for transgender students. Catherine Lhamon, who led OCR under the prior administration, called the action "stunning," saying it abandoned students whom the government had already found were subjected to discrimination.