Overview

• In mid-August the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights began administrative proceedings to suspend or terminate federal grants to Loudoun, Fairfax, Prince William, Arlington and Alexandria school systems after they declined to rescind policies letting students use facilities matching their gender identity.
• OCR’s July finding determined that those transgender-access rules violate Title IX under the Trump administration’s biology-based definition of sex and warned the districts they could face enforcement measures, including referral to the Justice Department.
• The five jurisdictions have publicly refused to change their policies, citing the Fourth Circuit’s Grimm v. Gloucester decision and Virginia law as legal authority for maintaining gender-inclusive facility access.
• The enforcement action follows investigations launched after a complaint by America First Legal and a 2025 Loudoun locker-room incident that prompted a Virginia attorney general probe and referral to federal authorities.
• District leaders have requested judicial review and stays of the Education Department’s actions, setting up protracted legal battles over the scope of Title IX protections for transgender students.