Eleven States Sue Obama Admin. over Transgender Directive

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, along with attorneys general in 10 other states, are suing the Obama administration over the president's directive to allow transgender students to use whatever bathroom that matches their gender preference.

The lawsuit is an attempt to make sure states can ignore the federal government's mandate.

The 10 other states joining the lawsuit include Arkansas, Oklahoma, Alabama, Wisconsin, West Virginia, Tennessee, Maine, Louisiana, Utah and Georgia.

They're asking the courts to declare the directive unlawful, accusing the administration of engineering a "massive social experiment, flouting the democratic process, and running roughshod over commonsense policies protecting children and basic privacy rights."

Supporters of the lawsuit argue that in addition to violating privacy and safety rights of women and children, the White House directive is a major overreach of power.

"Simply put, the Obama administration is creating new law, outside the boundaries of the Constitution - making changes only Congress can make," Paxton said.

Attorney Gayle Trotter agreed.

"I think the problem with the way the Obama administration has carried this out is that they haven't candidly assessed the cost of this type of policy," Trotter said on NPR.

"So we understand that women need privacy. They need safety in places that they frequent. And yet the Obama administration has decided to reinterpret an old law that never included transgender people for over 40 years," she said.

Trotter said the president is doing this from a Washington one-size-fits-all edict instead of going through Congress and having a national discussion.

Some schools are now worried if they don't comply, they will lose funding.

"We don't have a rule of law if we can reinterpret a more than 40-year-old law and say that the plain language, the black letter of the law is meaningless because someone has become enlightened about it," Trotter said.

Texas' lieutenant governor previously went as far as to say the state is willing to give up the $10 billion it receives in federal education dollars rather than comply.

The directive from the U.S. Justice and Education Departments represents an escalation in what the Obama administration calls a civil rights issue.

"This is about the dignity and respect we accord our fellow citizens and the laws that we, as a people and as a country, have enacted to protect them - indeed, to protect all of us," U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said.

This isn't the only legal fight over transgender rights. Earlier this month the Justice Department and the state of North Carolina sued each other over a state law curbing public restroom access for transgender people.

The question of whether federal civil rights law protects those who identify as transgender has no definitive answer and will likely be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Still, schools that refuse to comply with the Obama administration's directive could very likely be hit with civil rights lawsuits from the government and a cutoff from federal aid to education.