Beth Ann Rosica: Pennsylvania agency ignores Trump’s executive order on two sexes

White House photo, 2021 White House photo, 2021

One of President Trump’s first executive orders has quickly put hundreds of school districts across the commonwealth in a legal quandary over gender designations, as the newly signed order is in direct conflict with state regulations.

Titled, Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government, the order confirms the existence of only two sexes and reverses years of bad policies that harmed women and girls.

“It is the policy of the United States to recognize two sexes, male and female. These sexes are not changeable and are grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality…. ‘Sex’ shall refer to an individual’s immutable biological classification as either male or female.  ‘Sex’ is not a synonym for and does not include the concept of ‘gender identity.’

In 1925 words, the President restored sanity to our country and reinstated the initial intent of Title IX — to protect girls and women.

However, despite the order and the risk of losing federal education funding, it is unclear whether the state of Pennsylvania and school districts across the Commonwealth will comply.

In 2023, the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission (PHRC) approved and implemented new regulations to include gender identity in the definition of sex. These regulations were not passed or approved by the legislature, and they mirrored the language in Biden’s rewrite of the Title IX regulations.

In December 2024, the Biden administration abandoned its efforts to allow boys to compete against girls in school sports, and in January, a federal court ruled against the rewritten Title IX regulations. As a result of those actions, I contacted PHRC to ask whether they were planning to change their regulations and wrote about their response to maintain the current policies.

When the executive order was signed on January 20, 2025, I contacted PHRC again to ask if they were planning to make changes to comply.  Director of Communications, Amanda Brothman, doubled down on the department’s position.

“Regardless of what happens federally, protections on the basis of sex assigned at birth, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, and sex characteristics exist in Pennsylvania. In 2023, the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission released new regulations more clearly explaining the definition of sex. The Pennsylvania Human Relations Act and the Pennsylvania Fair Educational Opportunities Act prohibit discrimination in education, employment, housing, commercial property, and public accommodations.”

Regardless of what happens federally…….

Based on this statement from PHRC, they are unconcerned with following the law and the risk of losing federal education funding. 

School districts now find themselves in a dilemma. Are they expected to comply with the executive order or the state regulations? Will school districts defy state law in order to access federal funding?

Interestingly, last week, the Inquirer reported on the executive order and its potential impact on school district policies allowing students to use the bathroom of their choice based on gender identity. While their reporting briefly mentioned the PHRC regulations, it appears they did not request a comment from the agency.

The Inquirer did request a comment from the Governor’s office, and their response was quite different from the PHRC’s.

“A spokesperson for Gov. Josh Shapiro said Thursday the administration was still reviewing

the executive order and its potential impacts on Pennsylvania.”

The Governor’s office did not dig in their heels or even reference the PHRC regulations in their response to the Inquirer.

The issue is already a hot topic at local school board meetings.

The day following the inauguration and the signing of the executive order, Spring-Ford Area School District held a work session, and its solicitor, Mark Fitzgerald from Fox Rothschild, discussed the impact of the order and recent legislation.

He described the ruling in State of Tennessee vs. Cardona as “the final knockout blow to the 2024 Title IX regulations.”

However, he was quick to point out that while the district policies need to realign with the 2020 Title IX policy, it was also responsible to remain compliant with PHRC regulations. 

Fitzgerald was generally dismissive of the executive order signed the day before the meeting.

“There are obviously executive orders that are now coming out hot and heavy over the last day or two. We in our office and many solicitors are monitoring for its implications on school entities. Executive orders generally don’t have much when it comes to legally binding impact but when we see ones that could have, we will be in touch with Mr. Rizzo and his administration.”

Despite the solicitor’s perspective, there are a group of concerned parents who are very interested in the executive order and the policies enacted by the board. 

“The board continues to ignore the concerns of many parents who want their students safe in school, including having private spaces for boys’ and girls’ bathrooms and locker rooms. The district blatantly ignored the Moms 4 Liberty injunction last summer and passed a revised Title IX policy disregarding the court order,” according to Stacey (who requested to keep her last name private), a parent of children in the Spring-Ford District.

This situation is certain to cause controversy and contentious school board meetings over the next few months. Similar to the illegal masking mandate enacted in 2021 by the Secretary of Health and later overturned by the State Supreme Court, this issue will most likely be decided through litigation. In the meantime, school districts, students, and families are at the mercy of PHRC — yet another state agency that overstepped its authority.

Beth Ann Rosica resides in West Chester, has a Ph.D. in Education, and has dedicated her career to advocating on behalf of at-risk children and families. She covers education issues for Broad + Liberty. Contact her at barosica@broadandliberty.com.

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12 thoughts on “Beth Ann Rosica: Pennsylvania agency ignores Trump’s executive order on two sexes”

  1. Ms. Rosica is right. Because every week I read about how a woman is assaulted in a locker room by someone who is transgender. Oh, wait…….It does not happen.

    I would like to know what Trump’s executive order on this non-issue has done to lower the cost of groceries and gas.

    1. Yet Ms. Rosica never references any such hysterical claim in her article, while clearly and consistently citing law and the confusion created by the conflicting state policy. Your frequent flyer status in the comments appears to be the real hysterics here. Are you ok?

      1. “Yet Ms. Rosica never references any such hysterical claim in her article,” – You mean this hysterical claim; “The board continues to ignore the concerns of many parents who want their students safe in school, including having private spaces for boys’ and girls’ bathrooms and locker rooms.”

    2. Judah, just because you bury your head to hide yourself from seeing the many examples of violence against women in women spaces carried out by men, it doesn’t make the situations any less real. Your dismissal of the real struggles of women in shelters, prisons, health care settings and more who have experienced violence as a result of self identifying men entering their spaces make it clear you are no advocate for women and girls.

      1. “Your dismissal of the real struggles of women in shelters, prisons, health care settings and more who have experienced violence as a result of self-identifying men entering their spaces make it clear you are no advocate for women and girls.” – At no time did I say or imply this. If this is happening, why isn’t Ms. Rosica providing actual examples? This article was solely about school locker rooms.

        Ms. Rosica is a one-trick pony all she writes about is her transphobia and Covid In this column she managed to work both of them into it.

  2. Gee whiz – ten days in office and he hasn’t lowered the price of groceries or gas? My, my, my my my! He may indeed fail at doing it, but it is sure going to take a bit more than 10 days

    1. “Look, they got them up. I’d like to bring them down. It’s hard to bring things down once they’re up. You know, it’s very hard,” he said in the interview published Thursday. “But I think that they will. I think that energy is going to bring them down. I think a better supply chain is going to bring them down. You know, the supply chain is still broken. It’s broken,” Trump said. He also did not specify how he would fix any supply chain issues, pivoting instead to complaints about the Biden administration’s incentives for electric vehicles.”

      “I alone can fix it” – Donald Trump

      1. Que the “Twilight Zone” theme music. Judah! Quick! Run down to the local grocery store! They just lowered all prices by 27%. New Executive Order! Getting rid of Petey Buttigieg will fix the supply chain.

  3. This article is clearly written by a person who doesn’t understand how the laws work. An Executive order is not law. And when the Supremer court overturned Chevron last year any federal agency’s guidance is no longer given deference like it was.

    So, prior to last year, there was more weight afforded to how the executive branch interpreted laws. No longer.

    In fact, the very way M4L won their battle against the 2024 regs, holds exactly true for this executive order.

    The 3rd circuit already determined that Gender Identity was covered under previous title 9 regulations and state law can give more protections federal law.

    1. Unfortunately, we have to wait for the Doe Vs Boyertown SD travesty to be reversed (i.e. 3rd Circuit).

      Fortunately, because time unwinds all fraud, the bogus “evidence”, recklessness, and predatory practices of WPATH (relied upon in Boyertown) and AAP is being exposed. We now have the WPATH file leaks, the censored John Hopkins research, the Cass Review, and the deception described by whistle blowers like Jamie Reed. States are banning this mendacious experimentation on children. Malpractice suits are are rising, and the arachnids at WPATH are dying on the vine. More good news: legit evidence-based advocacy’s like SEGM, CAN-SQ, GenderReport, Genspect, lgbtcourage, etc., are rising…

  4. Your lack of legal understanding is remarkable. Executive Orders aren’t law. The executive branch can’t make law. This is just the first of MANY legally incorrect statements in this article.

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