LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders declared Thursday that the state won't comply with a federal regulation that seeks to protect the rights of transgender students in the nation’s schools, joining other Republican-led states that are defying the new rules.
Sanders signed an executive order stating that Arkansas schools will continue to enforce restrictions on which bathrooms and pronouns transgender students can use, laws that could be invalidated by the new regulations on how to enforce Title IX.
“My message to Joe Biden and the federal government is we will not comply,” Sanders said at a news conference at the state Capitol.
The regulation finalized last month seeks to clarify Title IX, a landmark 1972 sex discrimination law originally passed to address women’s rights and applied to schools and colleges receiving federal money. The regulations spell out that Title IX bars discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, too. Sanders called those changes a complete reinterpretation of the law.
Sanders' order follows similar moves by several other states, including Texas and Oklahoma, that have told schools to not comply with the new regulation. Lawsuits also have been filed in federal courts in Texas, Alabama, Louisiana and Kentucky challenging the rule. The multiple challenges give the states a better chance that one of them will put the rule on hold nationally.
Sanders' order follows several moves by Arkansas to restrict the rights of transgender youth. The state has appealed a judge's order striking down Arkansas' first-in-the-nation ban on gender affirming care for minors. A group of transgender, nonbinary and intersex residents sued the state earlier this week over its decision to no longer allow "X" instead of male or female on state-issued driver's licenses and identification cards.
“This act is a stark defiance of laws to protect against discrimination and a clear, aggressive attack on the well-being and freedoms of LGBTQ people in our state,” Megan Bailey, spokesperson for the American Civil Liberties Union of Arkansas, said in a statement.
Sanders' order calls on the state education department to give schools specific guidance, saying “at no point should Arkansas law be ignored.” In addition to laws on bathrooms and pronouns, the order cites Arkansas' law restricting what teams transgender athletes can play on. The Biden administration’s new rules broadly protect against discrimination based on sex, but they don’t offer guidance around transgender athletes.
Brandon Wolf, senior director of political communications and national press secretary of the LGBTQ advocay group Human Rights Campaign, warned that the state's refusal to comply could have damaging consequences including a significant loss in funding.
“That appears to be a sacrifice that those whose only priorities are themselves and their own political profiles are willing to make,” Wolf said in a statement.
Sanders said the state would pursue legal action for any loss of funding due to the new regulations.
Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders speaks at a news conference next to former Kentucky swimmer Riley Gaines at the state Capitol in Little Rock, Ark., Thursday, May 2, 2024. Sanders spoke before signing an executive order stating that Arkansas won't comply with new federal regulations intended to protect the rights of transgender students. (AP Photo/Andrew DeMillo)
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — Israel told the United Nations’ top court on Friday that a case brought by South Africa about its military operation in Gaza “makes a mockery of the heinous charge of genocide.”
The International Court of Justice is holding a third round of hearings on emergency measures requested by South Africa, which wants the court, based in The Hague in the Netherlands, to order a cease-fire in the enclave.
The allegations were “completely divorced from the facts and circumstances,” Israel’s deputy attorney general Gilad Noam told a panel of 15 international judges.
South Africa told the court on Thursday that the situation in Gaza has reached “a new and horrific stage” and urged judges to order Israel to halt its military operations. Israel must “totally and unconditionally withdraw” from the Gaza Strip, said Vusimuzi Madonsela, South Africa’s ambassador to the Netherlands.
Israel has strongly denied committing genocide in Gaza, saying it does all it can to spare civilians and is only targeting Hamas militants.
“We do not wish harm to these civilians as Hamas does,” Noam said, accusing the organization of using human shields.
South Africa has submitted four requests for the ICJ to investigate Israel. According to the latest request, the country says Israel's military incursion in Rafah threatens the “very survival of Palestinians in Gaza.”
In January, judges ordered Israel to do all it can to prevent death, destruction and any acts of genocide in Gaza, but the panel stopped short of ordering an end to the military offensive.
The court has already found that there is a “real and imminent risk” to the Palestinian people in Gaza by Israel’s military operations.
ICJ judges have broad powers to order a cease-fire and other measures, though the court doesn't have its own enforcement apparatus. A 2022 order by the court demanding that Russia halt its full-scale invasion of Ukraine has so far gone unheeded.
Most of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million people have been displaced since fighting began.
The war began with a Hamas attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7 in which Palestinian militants killed around 1,200 people and took about 250 hostages. More than 35,000 Palestinians have been killed in the war, Gaza’s Health Ministry says, without distinguishing between civilians and combatants in its count.
South Africa initiated proceedings in December 2023 and sees the legal campaign as rooted in issues central to its identity. Its governing party, the African National Congress, has long compared Israel’s policies in Gaza and the occupied West Bank to its own history under the apartheid regime of white minority rule, which restricted most Blacks to “homelands.” Apartheid ended in 1994.
Follow AP's coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war
Israel's agents Gilad Naom, left, Tamar Kaplan Tourgeman, center, and co-agent Avigail Frisch Ben Avraham, right, wait for the start of hearings at the International Court of Justice, in The Hague, Netherlands, Thursday, May 16, 2024. The U.N.'s top court opened two days of hearings in a case brought by South Africa to see whether Israel needs to take additional measures to alleviate the suffering in war-ravaged Gaza. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)
The Peace Palace office of the International Court of Justice, or World Court, is pictured through a fence in The Hague, Netherlands, Thursday, May 16, 2024. The U.N.'s top court opened two days of hearings in a case brought by South Africa to see whether Israel needs to take additional measures to alleviate the suffering in war-ravaged Gaza. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)
The Peace Palace, office of the International Court of Justice, or World Court, is pictured through a fence in The Hague, Netherlands, Thursday, May 16, 2024. The U.N.'s top court opened two days of hearings in a case brought by South Africa to see whether Israel needs to take additional measures to alleviate the suffering in war-ravaged Gaza. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)
Judges enter the International Court of Justice, in The Hague, Netherlands, Thursday, May 16, 2024. The U.N.'s top court opened two days of hearings in a case brought by South Africa to see whether Israel needs to take additional measures to alleviate the suffering in war-ravaged Gaza. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)
Front row from left, South Africa's agents Cornelius Scholtz, Vusimuzi Madonsela and Israel's agents Gilad Naom, Tamar Kaplan Tourgeman and co-agent Avigail Frisch Ben Avraham wait for the start of hearings at the International Court of Justice, in The Hague, Netherlands, Thursday, May 16, 2024. The U.N.'s top court opened two days of hearings in a case brought by South Africa to see whether Israel needs to take additional measures to alleviate the suffering in war-ravaged Gaza. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)
