OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Another federal court has dealt a blow to the Biden administration’s far-left social agenda in a Friday ruling that is nevertheless likely to be appealed by the White House.
Last year, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission issued a rule that sought to protect LGBTQ individuals from workplace discrimination which permitted them to use bathrooms and pronouns based on their gender identity. The rule was immediately challenged in court by a number of states including Texas as an unconstitutional infringement on companies.
In an Oct. 1 decision, U.S. District Court Judge for the Northern District of Texas Matthew Kacsmaryk, a Trump nominee, agreed, ruling that the protections went too far, writing in his opinion that while Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 protects LGBTQ individuals from discriminatory hiring practices, that doesn’t cover “necessarily all correlated conduct” including choosing which bathroom and pronouns to use.
The EEOC’s guidelines were issued in the wake of a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court, which earlier found in Bostock v. Clayton County “that Title VII extends to protect individuals in the workplace from discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity,” The Daily Caller reported, adding: “Several LGBT employees sued after losing their jobs because of their sexual orientation and gender identity.”
“Case by case, category by category, controversy by controversy, Justice Gorsuch deferred judgement, stating Bostock decided only what Bostock decided . . . . Curiously, the Guidances imply and Defendants continue to argue that Bostock’s reach exceeds the grasp of its author . . . . Defendants . . . cannot rely on the words and reasoning of Bostock itself to explain why the Court prejudged what the Court expressly refused to prejudge,” Kacmaryk wrote.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sued the administration in September 2021 over the guidance, arguing that it “increas[ed] for the State in its capacity as an employer — and Burrows did not even have authority to issue it.” He also argued that states have the inherent authority to act under their own policies instead of relying on such specific employer guidance from the federal government.
“The court decision’s is not only a win for the rule of law, but for the safety and protection of Texas children,” Paxton said in a press release. “The Biden Administration’s attempts to radicalize federal law to track its woke political beliefs are beyond dangerous. I will continue to push back against these unlawful attempts to use federal agencies to normalize extremist positions that put millions of Texans at risk.”
The statement also noted:
Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller supported this challenge and provided compelling evidence that the rule conflicted with the Department of Agriculture’s authority to set reasonable workplace policies. Paxton later amended the lawsuit to include the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as a defendant after the agency released a new rule threatening to cut federal funding to states that prohibit “sex-change” procedures and classify it as child abuse. The District Court struck down both rules.
Last week, the Biden administration was blocked by a federal court from imposing limitations on arrests, detentions, and removals by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Southern District of Ohio Judge Michael Newman made the decision after a lawsuit was filed by Republican Attorneys General of Arizona, Montana, and Ohio. He issued a preliminary injunction stopping Biden from imposing the new guidelines on punishments for illegal immigration.
“The States sue because they believe DHS skirted Congress’s immigration enforcement mandates when it issued a policy that prioritizes certain high-risk noncitizens for apprehension and removal,” the judge said. “DHS contends that seemingly mandatory statutes must be read flexibly to permit efficient law enforcement.”
“At bottom, that is what this dispute is about: can the Executive displace clear congressional command in the name of resource allocation and enforcement goals? Here, the answer is no,” he added.
Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich, Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen, and Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost sued the Biden administration in November 2021 over the policy revision, which they said: “dramatically ties the hands of immigration officers, halting nearly all deportations.”
That month, the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, issued permanent guidance to limit whom ICE could arrest and thus remove from the country.
