Betsy DeVos on Biden’s Title IX Plan to Kill Women’s Sports

CLAY: We got Betsy DeVos, education secretary under President Trump. She has got a piece up at the New York Post: “Biden’s Radical Title IX Plan Would Kill Women’s Sports.” She’s also got a book out in June, Hostages No More: The Fight for Education Freedom and the Future of the American Child. Ms. DeVos, I appreciate you coming on with us. This, by the way, you did a phenomenal job on Title IX investigations on college campuses.

They had turned completely into kangaroo courts, and I don’t think you get enough credit for it, and I know the Biden administration has tried to walk back some of the protections you gave to students. But the Obama administration errors in the Title IX investigations in particular into sexual assault were a travesty of justice so I want to start by saying “thank you,” and what is the latest — ’cause I know many people out there have sons and daughters on college campuses and these kangaroo courts as it pertains to Title IX were a total joke. Where are we now with those?

DEVOS: Well, first of all, happy birthday.

CLAY: Thank you.

DEVOS: So what the Biden administration is trying to do now is really the second major round of weaponizing Title IX to suit their political agenda. The first time around in the Obama administration, as you mentioned, they took Title IX, sent “Dear colleague” letters and basically created kangaroo courts on college campuses across the country. Hundreds of young people were unjustly treated; due process was thrown out the window.

We turned that all around, did the regulating, did the proper procedures to make sure the Title IX rule was going to be fair, balanced, and predictable for anyone who has to be involved in one of those issues. What they’re doing now is going a major step further and changing the definition of biological sex to include sex stereotyping to redefine sex-related characteristics, including intersex traits and just expanding the definition of sex as we know it biologically.

Which would, in effect, kill women’s sports, which Title IX was in part created to really protect and advance and expand the equal access to sports. Anytime you have a biological male competing as a woman on a woman’s team, it’s hard to say that you’re honoring the purpose of Title IX for women.

BUCK: Speaking to Betsy DeVos, former education secretary under President Trump. Betsy, what is the effect of this going to be? I’m just seeing some of the numbers here. For people who think that this is an issue that’s limited so much in scope, obviously with Lia Thomas now it’s been in the headlines, more and more people from Gen Z are identifying as trans.

So it’s likely that there will be more sports — we were just talking about this, NCAA sports — where there are trans competitors. And so now it won’t even be up to the school, right? It will mean that there is essentially a federal civil rights violation under Title IX if a trans individual who is biologically male is not allowed to compete against women? Is that how the Biden change will work?

DEVOS: Yes, that is entirely within the scope of what they are preparing with the Title IX rule changes. They are not… The “Party of Science” seems to be discounting science in every regard. And I would argue the only science they’re following is political science. They are playing to the far-left fringe of their party, and they continue to really massively overreach in these areas where the population is just left dumbfounded.

The notion that biological males who are stronger, have more bone density, have greater cardiovascular capacity, greater muscle mass — stronger, taller, longer arm wing spans — that they should be able to compete on a women’s team at any point is just beyond the pale, and it will totally ruin Title IX.

CLAY: So Boris Johnson came out today and said this is wrong — and we played the audio from him earlier in the show — biological men should not be competing against women. Why will Joe Biden not say the same thing?

DEVOS: Well, it’s a very good question, and arguably it’s because he continues to play to the far-left fringe of his party, and I think with the hopes of trying to take attention off all of the other massive failures that he’s overseeing. But we have to fight this, because before we know it, if they continue in the process that they have undertaken to do new rulemaking, we will find ourselves essentially killing women’s sports across the country.

And it’s totally unfair to all the thousands and thousands of young women who are working hard and training in their favorite sport to compete. The notion that they would have to face and compete against biological men is simply unfair, and it’s untenable.

BUCK: Betsy, I also know that you’ve been on the forefront of the fight for charter schools, both in the past when you were President Trump’s education secretary, and now you’ve written about what I believe you called the Biden administration’s — what? — secret war against charter schools, if I remember the headline. What’s going on with charter schools?

‘Cause parents right now all across the country are mobilized and interested in taking an active role at the administrative level, at the parent-teacher meeting and school board level, more so than we’ve seen in a very long time. What’s the Biden administration doing to charter schools and school choice right now?

DEVOS: Well, absolutely. They are trying by every means possible to shut down any further expansion of charter schools. So while there are over a million kids that we know of on wait lists to get into charter schools across the country, the Biden administration through the Department of Education is putting out new rules that will essentially eliminate any charter expansion by requiring school districts to prove that the schools — the public, the traditional public schools — are overcapacity and that there’s too many students for them to be able to handle.

Well, this essentially says we will never open another charter school ,or we will never allow another one to be expanded through the federal charter school grant program because it’s not based on demand for the charters. It’s based on whether the district decides they have too many kids in their school system. That’s never gonna happen. We’ve seen all of the politics played regularly by the teachers union in the system, and so they are trying to effectively kill charter expansion and expanding opportunities for parents to choose the right setting for their kids.

CLAY: Betsy, you, I believe, were a swimmer. I know you’ve got a couple of daughters. I’m betting — I don’t know this for sure — that you’ve got some granddaughters as well. So does a huge percentage of our audience out there. What should we do, really, to be aggressive? What would you tell those women who are competing against biological men? They’re in a tough spot too. What advice would you give them?

What would you say for people out there with their granddaughters, with their daughters who are trying to excel in sports, working as hard as they can and then, boom! Suddenly they run right into a biological male who is going to be bigger, stronger, and faster than them no matter how hard they work?

DEVOS: Well, I would urge them to pay attention to this process. So it’s a rulemaking process. There will be a time for public comment. And we need to ensure that the Department of Education is deluged with observations, complaints, opinions around what expanding the definition of biological sex will mean for the future of women’s sports.

Being quiet at this point in time and not raising voices is absolutely the opposite of what should be done. We have got to make sure that every person for whom this is an important issue and even those who don’t think it is speak up, tell your members of Congress, write and send your opinions in in this rule making process so that this will get shut down in its infancy.

BUCK: The book out in June, Hostages No More: The Fight for Education Freedom and the Future of the American Child. Betsy DeVos, the author. Betsy, thanks so much for being with us. Appreciate it.

DEVOS: It’s a pleasure, and have a great birthday.

CLAY: Thank you. Appreciate that.