Top Class Actions’s website and social media posts use affiliate links. If you make a purchase using such links, we may receive a commission, but it will not result in any additional charges to you. Please review our Affiliate Link Disclosure for more information.
Students at 25 federally-funded Christian colleges and universities across the country were discriminated against at school for their sexual orientation or gender identity, breaching the constitution, a new lawsuit alleges.
In a class action lawsuit filed in United States District Court in Oregon Monday, LGBTQ students took aim at a religious exemption built into the civil rights law that prohibits sex-based discrimination, NBC News reports.
Title IX protects people from discrimination based on sex in education programs or activities that receive federal financial assistance
However, an educational institution that is controlled by a religious organization is exempt from Title IX if “compliance would not be consistent with the religious tenets of such organization”, according to the Department of Education.
This means that many Christian colleges and universities receive federal funding while still being allowed to enforce policies like prohibiting same-sex relationships on campus, or banning “transgender conduct.”
The lawsuit was filed on behalf of students by the Religious Exemption Accountability Project (REAP), an organization that advocates for LGBTQ students at taxpayer-funded religious colleges and universities.
REAP Director Paul Southwick told NBC News the class action lawsuit seeks to strike down the exemption as unconstitutional, saying the government is “not allowed to pass laws or take actions that target a politically unpopular group.”
He said the religious exemption to Title IX targets people based on sex, sexual orientation and gender identity, for inferior treatment.
The students claim they faced discrimination at religious colleges such as being denied admission, being expelled, or facing strict policies around sexuality and purity due to being LGBTQ.
Student Lucas Wilson told NBC News he went to Virginia’s Liberty University, where he was offered conversion therapy in the form of a student club and had several classes that taught “the evils of the homosexual lifestyle.”
He said it had taken years to break down the feelings of shame, guilt and anxiety the culture had amplified and compounded in him.
The lawsuit argues that the exemption is unconstitutional because it violates the due process and equal protection rights afforded to LGBTQ people, and favors fundamentalist religious institutions above other educational establishments.
Southwick pointed to a 1983 case in which the Supreme Court held 8-1 that Bob Jones University could not hold its tax-exempt status due to an interracial dating ban it said it held due to religious beliefs, NBC reported.
In that case, the court ruled limitations on religious liberty could be justified by an “overriding governmental interest” like prohibiting racial discrimination.
Meanwhile, President Joe Biden, a practicing Catholic, recently signed an Executive Order expressly guaranteeing an educational environment free from discrimination on the basis of sex, “including discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.”
Title IX was in the news last year when efforts to block the implementation of controversial changes to its rules before the new school year failed, with a federal judge refusing to take action against the Department of Education.
What do you think about this new lawsuit? Do you think Title IX should contain a religious exemption?
Read About More Class Action Lawsuits & Class Action Settlements:
