News Release
For Immediate Release: February 23, 2017
Contact: Diane Gramley 1.814.271.9078
President Praised for Bringing Sanity Back Into Bathroom Debate
(Harrisburg) — President Trump’s Department of Education (DOE) and Department of Justice (DOJ) have sent a joint Dear Colleague letter to public schools rescinding the Obama administration’s previous May 13, 2016 Dear Colleague letter demanding that every public school in the nation put safety before sanity and open their bathroom, locker and shower rooms to biological boys who think they are girls and vice versa. The American Family Association of Pennsylvania (AFA of PA) had condemned the Obama mandate from day one and had contacted school districts across the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania advising them that the law — Title IX — had not changed and that the Obama administration had no legal authority to simply reinterpret a law. This most recent Dear Colleague letter from the DOE and DOJ will remove the confusion among schools which was caused by last year’s Obama administration misinterpretation of Title IX.
“Finally there is someone in the White House who can read and understand that Congress had no intention of allowing boys into girls’ restrooms, locker and shower rooms when they passed Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972. The Obama administration’s redefinition of the word ‘sex’ in Title IX put political correctness ahead of sanity and safety and caused great confusion within school districts across the nation. The decision of placing the safety of girls in danger by allowing boys into their private spaces should be left up to the state and the local school board which is then accountable to the local voters. Opening bathroom usage to whomever should never have been a federal mandate,” Diane Gramley, president of the AFA of PA responded.
Title IX language — “no person … 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” — does not contain the words “gender identity” and nothing in the congressional record indicates that was even a consideration during the debate.
“The Trump Administration is right to reiterate that claims of discrimination, bullying and harassment will be investigated. Students who identify as transgender should not be harassed or bullied, but neither should they be allowed to use the restrooms, locker and shower rooms of their choice. Commonsense tells us that simply claiming to be the opposite sex does not make it so. Biology should be the determining factor of which private facility to use and not political correctness which especially places girls at risk,” Gramley concluded.
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