Collegiate Collusion: The Biden Education Department Relied on Outside Allied Special Interest Groups when Developing Title IX Policy

New documents obtained by PPT show just how cozy special interest groups and the Education Department were together under the Biden administration.

When the Biden administration Education Department (ED) attempted its controversial rewrite of Title IX that a federal judge “found the Education Department overstepped its authority by expanding the scope of Title IX,” it was not just Secretary Miguel Cardona making the call.

No, joining the secretary and Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Catherine Lhamon in crafting the Biden administration’s Title IX policy were a litany of outside allied special interest groups looking to impose their own worldview on America’s students and schools. Protect the Public’s Trust (PPT) obtained documents via the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) detailing the organizations invited and attending these meetings with the Biden ED and just how much influence these groups had on our executive branch.

This is nothing new. The Biden administration was outsourcing public policy on everything from climate policy in John Kerry’s secretive State Department office, Treasury tax policy, school reopening guidance by CDC, and more. This practice removed the American public’s will from the rules they have to live under.

ED held four quarterly meetings on May 12, 2023; August 11, 2023; December 6, 2023; and March 7, 2024, where these special interest groups were given the “concierge-like service” from the department as the Biden’s ED was crafting and developing Title IX policy. These “stakeholders” — as the department called them in the August 2023 Office of Civil Rights (OCR) quarterly meeting briefing to Cardona — included leaders of allied groups such as GLSEN (formerly known as the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network) and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). 

In fact, leaders from GLSEN; the ACLU; the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund (MALDEF); the NAACP Legal Defense Fund; the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law; and the National Center for Learning Disabilities (NCLD) did not miss a single quarterly Title IX stakeholder meeting held by the Biden ED.

These new documents provide further evidence of policy in the Biden administration being driven by outside special interest groups, as well as how much these groups influenced U.S. policies, including Title IX.

“Yet again we see the role that powerful allied special interests played in developing policy during the Biden administration, including at ED,” said Michael Chamberlain, Director of Protect the Public’s Trust. “PPT earlier revealed teachers unions getting concierge-level service while the department couldn’t figure out how to engage with parents. The influence of these organizations on the administration’s Title IX rules provides another example that outsourcing policy was the order of the day.” 

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