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Tennessee federal judge blocks Biden Administration LGBTQ protections [1]

['Jamie Satterfield', 'More From Author', '- July']

Date: 2022-07-18  

A Tennessee federal judge is blocking the Biden administration from enforcing an executive order designed to protect the LGBTQ community from discrimination in schools and the workplace.

U.S. District Judge Charles Atchley Jr. on Friday issued a preliminary injunction that temporarily bars the U.S. Department of Education and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission from enforcing the anti-discrimination executive order issued by the Biden administration in January 2021.

The ruling comes in a lawsuit filed by Tennessee Attorney General Herbert H. Slatery III and his colleagues in 19 Republican states — Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, and West Virginia.

“The court understands that a preliminary injunction is an extraordinary remedy,” wrote Atchley, a 2020 Republican appointee to the court. “However, this case presents extraordinary circumstances.”

The Biden executive order came after a June 2020 landmark decision by the U.S. Supreme Court that expanded the legal definition of sex discrimination to include sexual orientation and gender identity in employment situations.

Citing the high court’s decision, the Biden administration directed federal agencies to enact rules that specifically prohibited sex discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. In June 2021, the Department of Education and EEOC, in turn, issued “guidance documents,” prohibiting such discrimination and promising enforcement action against violators, including the loss of federal funding for schools.

Several Republican-led states, including Tennessee, already had laws on the books that appeared to violate that “guidance,” including statutes that bar schools from allowing transgender youth to participate in girls’ sport and bar schools and businesses from allowing transgender youth and adults from using restrooms that align with their identity.

With Slatery in the lead, attorneys general for 20 Republican-led states filed suit in U.S. District Court in Knoxville to block enforcement of Biden’s order and the agencies’ related “guidance documents,” arguing, among other things, a violation of states’ rights to govern.

They asked Atchley to issue a preliminary injunction, barring any change in discrimination policy until their lawsuit can be heard, decided and appealed.

In his Friday ruling, Atchley agreed.

The judge said the Biden administration had gone too far and too quickly, stretching the U.S. Supreme Court’s employment-based decision beyond its “narrow” holding, usurping the authority of Congress and state Legislatures and failing to give lawmakers and the public a say on the issue.

“At a minimum, (the Biden administration executive order and agencies’) guidance appears to deem conduct required by plaintiffs’ state laws to be unlawful sex discrimination under federal law,” Atchley wrote. “(The administration) has vowed to enforce these statues consistent with the challenged guidance, and (the Biden administration and agencies) do not dispute that an enforcement action puts (states) at risk of losing substantial federal funding.”

This story was published earlier by the Tennessee Lookout, an affiliate of the nonprofit States Newsroom that includes the Florida Phoenix.

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[1] Url: https://floridaphoenix.com/2022/07/18/tennessee-federal-judge-blocks-biden-administration-lgbtq-protections/

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