Media Release: Complaint Filed with Office of Civil Rights to Investigate Title IX Violations in Rhode Island

Providence, RI – The Law Centre at the RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity filed an official complaint with the Office for Civil Rights at the United States Department of Education last evening, calling for an investigation into alleged Title IX violations by nine named state actors.

Referring to President Trump’s recent Executive Order, “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government” and a related US DOE “Dear Colleague” letter to K-12 schools advising of planned enforcement of the Trump Administration’s 2020 Title IX rule, the complaint letter named the following entities:

• RI Commissioner of Eduction, Angelica Infante-Green
• The RI Interscholastic League
• RI Attorney General, Peter Neronha
• Six RI School Districts: Barrington, Chariho, Cumberland, East Greenwich, North Kingstown, and Providence

Each of the named entities has been notified separately of the complaint, which can be viewed in-full, here.

Attorney Gregory Piccirilli, advisor to the Law Centre, crafted the complaint, which includes a letter and 14 exhibits detailing prior communications with RIDE, RIDE Regulations and Guidance, RIIL Rules, and the trans-gender policies of the six school districts.

The 16-page letter, in part, cited the February 28 letter to RI school districts by Attorney General Peter Neronha, which questioned the legality and enforceability of the above cited federal actions and essentially advising state education entities to maintain their existing trans-gender policies.

The Law Centre believes such an approach puts every school district at severe risk of loss of federal funding, discrimination lawsuits, or further OCR investigations.

To avoid legal and financial consequences, the Center recommends that RIDE, RIIL, and every school district in the State should rescind their existing trans-gender policies, if they defy the new federal law, and to craft their own policies that comply with both state and federal statutes.

Piccirilli is a member of the Law Centre sub-committee of the Board of Directors for the RI Center for Freedom of Prosperity. He, along with sub-committee chair, Giovanni D. Cicione, and fellow member, attorney Suzanne McGee Cienki, are available for media interviews, upon request.