California Rejects Federal Push to End Transgender Participation in School Sports

The state refused to sign a federal resolution agreement and says its laws support athletic participation based on gender identity.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks during an address on June 10, 2025. Office of California Governor via AP

California education officials are refusing to end policies that allow students who identify as transgender to participate in school sports consistent with their gender identities, rejecting pressure from the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR).

In a letter dated July 7, the California Department of Education (CDE) told OCR that it “respectfully disagrees with OCR’s analysis” and will not sign a proposed resolution agreement involving student athletic participation. The letter, signed by General Counsel Len Garfinkel, came in response to a June 25 letter of finding from OCR.

According to a June 25 statement, OCR concluded that California’s sports policy—allowing students to participate in programs aligned with their gender identities—discriminates against female athletes by allowing males to compete in girls’ sports and use female-only facilities.

The department proposed a resolution agreement requiring the state to adopt biology-based definitions of sex and restore athletic titles and records to impacted female students.

“Although Governor Gavin Newsom admitted months ago it was ‘deeply unfair’ to allow men to compete in women’s sports, both the California Department of Education and the California Interscholastic Federation continued as recently as a few weeks ago to allow men to steal female athletes’ well-deserved accolades and to subject them to the indignity of unfair and unsafe competitions,” U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said at the time, referring to comments Newsom made on a podcast earlier this year.

The June 25 statement also noted that OCR had opened separate investigations into both the California Department of Education and the California Interscholastic Federation and warned that failure to comply could result in enforcement action from the Department of Justice.

The state’s rejection comes just days after a similar resolution agreement was reached with a Pennsylvania university. On July 1, the Department of Education announced that the University of Pennsylvania had signed a resolution agreement to resolve Title IX violations stemming from its decision to allow Lia Thomas, a male, to compete on the women’s swimming team and access female locker rooms.

Under the agreement, UPenn must restore records and titles to affected female swimmers, issue public apologies, adopt biology-based definitions of sex, and affirm that it will no longer permit male athletes to compete in women’s sports.

McMahon called the agreement “a great victory for women and girls” and said it was the result of “the Trump effect in action.”

By contrast, California’s education department has rejected the federal government’s interpretation of Title IX, asserting that the state’s gender identity protections are consistent with the U.S. Constitution and court precedent.

The July 7 letter follows a separate dispute with the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ). On June 2, the DOJ sent letters to California school districts claiming that compliance with the California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) policy—which permits students to participate in sports based on their gender identities—violated the equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution. The DOJ warned districts that they could face legal liability unless they certified noncompliance by June 9.

California declined. In a formal response dated June 9, the CDE wrote that “the Equal Protection Clause does not require that athletic teams be segregated by ‘biological sex’” and argued that the CIF policy and California’s Education Code “neither classify nor discriminate based on biological sex.”

A spokesperson for the California Department of Education and Newsom’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Epoch Times. The U.S. Department of Education Office of Civil Rights has not publicly commented on California’s July 7 response and also did not respond to a request for comment by publication time.