Kansas Stands Against Obama Admin's School Bathroom Order

Kansas will not force school districts to allow students to use restrooms of the gender with which they identify.

The Kansas State Board of Education voted unanimously to ignore the directive from the Obama administration. Instead, they're leaving the decision up to the individual school districts.

The Obama administration has threatened to withhold federal aid from states that don't comply. That aid makes up about 10 percent of the Kansas education budget.

Scott Gordon, general counsel for the state's education department, says he does not think the board's statement will jeopardize federal aid.

He says the threat of loss of federal funding is not sweeping, contending that the entire state would not lose federal education funding if one school is found out of compliance with the anti-discrimination law. 

Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt announced earlier this month that the state will sue the U.S. Departments of Justice and Education, which issued the bathroom decree. 

Schmidt has not yet decided whether the state will join the lawsuit being filed by Texas and 10 other states, or sue separately.