President Donald Trump’s Department of Education (ED) announced on Tuesday that it is issuing a “Letter of Impending Enforcement Action” to San Jose State University (SJSU) for its policies prioritizing transgender-identifying male athletes over women.
The move comes after ED concluded in January that SJSU’s policies allowing men to access women’s sports and spaces violates Title IX, which bars sex discrimination as a condition of receiving federal funding. The investigation centered around the school’s handling of trans-identifying male volleyball player Blaire Fleming from 2022-2024.
ED gave the school a chance to resolve its Title IX violation voluntarily, which the SJSU ultimately rejected before filing a lawsuit along with the California State University (CSU) against ED, demanding the department rescind its findings and continue to fund the university.
“We have provided SJSU with multiple opportunities to resolve its Title IX violations with common sense actions: separating male and female athletes based on their biological sex, keeping men out of women’s locker rooms and bathrooms, restoring rightfully-earned titles and accolades to female athletes, and apologizing to the women forced to forfeit competitions to protect themselves. Yet, SJSU remains obstinate, choosing a radical ideology over safety, dignity, and fairness for its own students,” Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Kimberly Richey said in a statement.
“With today’s action, the Department is putting the university on notice: comply with the law or risk losing its federal funding,” Richey continued.
ED said SJSU has ten days to comply with Title IX or “face enforcement action, including referral to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and risk of termination of SJSU’s federal funding.”
In its investigation, ED’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) found that the school actively recruited and allowed Fleming to compete on the women’s indoor and beach volleyball teams beginning in 2022, according to ED. SJSU allegedly told coaching staff not to tell female players that the athlete was a man.
“In addition to privacy concerns, the presence of this male athlete presented a safety concern for female athletes and provided SJSU’s volleyball team with an unfair physical advantage over opposing teams. On multiple occasions, the male athlete spiked the ball so forcefully that it knocked females on the opposing team to the ground,” ED alleged in a previous press release. “During one season, seven all-women’s teams from other universities forfeited their competitions, accepting a loss rather than competing against a male.”
OCR also concluded that the school violated Title IX by not quickly and fairly investigating complaints filed by female athletes about the male athlete on their team, and by “taking action that discouraged women from participating in the Title IX process,” ED said.
“In addition, days after a SJSU female volleyball player joined a Title IX lawsuit against the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), she discovered that the male student had conspired to have a member of the opposing team spike her in the face during an upcoming match,” ED previously said. “SJSU did not investigate the conspiracy, but later subjected this female athlete to a Title IX complaint for reportedly ‘misgendering’ the male athlete when discussing this incident in online videos and interviews.”
When reached for comment about ED’s latest action, a spokesperson for SJSU referred Breitbart News to a March 6 online blog post from the school’s president, Dr. Cynthia Teniente-Matson, announcing its lawsuit against the department.
Teniente-Matson emphasized in her blog post that the school prioritizes LGBTQ+ students over female athletes. She wrote:
Our support for the LGBTQ members of our community, who have experienced threats and harms over the last several years remains unwavering. We know the attention the university has received around this issue and the investigative process that followed have been unsettling for many in our community. We’ve heard the fear and anxiety that it has created and recognize that waiting for the university’s response has been difficult at a time already filled with uncertainty. We appreciate the campus entities that have provided support as well as time and space for people to express their feelings and experiences, and our engagements will continue.
I want to make this clear. All of our students, faculty and staff deserve to be treated fairly, with the rights and protections granted under federal and state law, including privacy rights, and to live and learn free from discrimination. We respect and value our LGBTQ community members, as we do all members of our community, and we are dedicated to fostering an inclusive, supportive environment that encourages full participation in all aspects of university life without fear of harm or exclusion. If you are experiencing harassment or discrimination on campus, we strongly encourage you to report it to our Office for Title IX and Equal Opportunity. We are here to help. Spartans take care of Spartans.
Teniente-Matson said the university would be “unable to comment further” on the situation because of litigation.
Katherine Hamilton is a political reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on X @thekat_hamilton.
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