Supreme Court rejects Biden administration’s request to enforce new civil rights protections for LGBTQ+ students

CNN — The Supreme Court on Friday turned down a request from the Biden administration to enforce parts of a new federal rule meant to protect LGBTQ+ and pregnant students from discrimination in 10 states where the rule was put on hold by federal judges. Pointing to provisions of the rule that deal with pregnancy discrimination or preemployment inquiries about a candidate’s marital status, Sotomayor said that the states “offer nothing to justify preventing the government from enforcing those parts of the rule.” But the court’s brief per curiam opinion said that it was the government’s burden to demonstrate that those provisions could be separated from the ones that were challenged and “on this limited record … the Government has not provided this Court a sufficient basis to disturb the lower courts’ interim conclusions.” Gorsuch’s decision to join Sotomayor’s partial dissent was notable, in part because he wrote a landmark majority opinion in 2020 that said gay and transgender Americans in the workplace should be protected from discrimination based on their “sex.” The Supreme Court’s order means that the entire new rule will remain on hold for now in Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Virginia, West Virginia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana and Idaho. Technical legal fight could have widespread impact Two separate lawsuits brought by the Republican attorneys general of the 10 states claimed that three specific provisions of the new rule are unlawful: the provision that expands the scope of “sex;” a provision that would bar schools from disallowing transgender students from using bathrooms or locker rooms consistent with their gender identity; and a provision clarifying that the law’s prohibition on “hostile-environment harassment” could implicate anti-trans conduct. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, who oversees appeals on behalf of the federal government, wrote in court papers last month that the injunctions were overbroad and should have been limited to the provisions that the states said would cause them “irreparable harm.” She described the rule as being an “omnibus rule” with various parts that could be severed by federal judges examining the rule’s legality. The states challenging the changes, Prelogar told the court, “do not contend – and the lower courts did not purport to hold – that those provisions conflict with Title IX, the Constitution, or any other federal law.” She also pointed to an order issued by the Supreme Court earlier this year in a case concerning Idaho’s ban on gender-affirming care for trans youth.