The Department of Education announced Monday that it is formally scrapping the Biden administration’s Title IX regulations and reinstating the rules first put in place during President Donald Trump’s first term. The change takes effect Tuesday.
Under the final rule, the department’s anti-discrimination policy will define sex as male or female at birth, removing Biden-era protections that had extended Title IX coverage to sexual orientation and gender identity for students and employees at federally funded schools.
The 2024 regulations had also required schools to use transgender students’ preferred pronouns and altered how schools processed harassment complaints. Those rules were struck down by a federal court in January 2025, after which the Education Department told schools it would go back to enforcing the 2020 regulations. Monday’s action formally updates the published federal rulebook to reflect that shift, though schools have already been operating under the earlier standard.
The department said it was able to move forward with the formal repeal after the last remaining lawsuits over the Biden-era rules were dismissed in August.
Education Secretary Linda McMahon said the change brings the written regulations in line with both the courts and her department’s practice.
Today’s rulemaking clears the Biden Administration’s illegal rewrite of Title IX from the Code of Federal Regulations and restores the commonsense language promulgated in the first Trump Administration, which we have been enforcing since the first days of the Administration. Thanks to today’s action, the published Title IX regulations faithfully reflects court orders and Congressional intent—reducing confusion for parents, students, and educational institutions. We will continue to relentlessly champion equal opportunity for all Americans and hold accountable any school or college that violates the rights, privacy, or athletic opportunities of our women and girls.
The rule follows a 2025 executive order from Trump directing federal agencies to recognize only male and female as sexes and to apply that definition when enforcing laws against sex discrimination.
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