The headline on the New York Times homepage reads:
Trump Rescinds Transgender Student Protections
No, Trump has done nothing of the kind. Transgender students still enjoy the same civil rights we all enjoy.
What the Trump administration has done, as you probably already know, is return the suddenly all-consuming matter of whether transgender kids get to use public school bathrooms of their gender identity to the states.
Ryan Anderson of the Daily Signal explains why this was the right thing to do:
The Trump administration acted Wednesday night to fix the Obama administration’s unlawful “gender identity” school policy and return authority to parents and teachers in the states.
Civil rights officers in the Department of Justice and the Department of Education issued a joint letter saying the administration was rescinding the policy, which had required schools to allow students who identify as transgender to use the restrooms, locker rooms and similar facilities of their choice—or face loss of federal funds.
In the letter, they said the Obama mandate did not show “due regard for the primary role of the states and local school districts” in making education policy.
The Trump administration is doing the right thing in correcting Obama’s unlawful overreach, which imposed a one-sided solution on all 50 states. Parents and teachers in local schools now can work to find win-win solutions that protect the dignity, privacy, and safety of all students.
In other words, your kid's school bathroom is no longer a federal matter.
This doesn't mean (pace the New York Times) that it is suddenly okay to mistreat transgender kids. It just means that people closer to the scene will decide. But promoting hysteria is a better way to sell the story–and if it churns up a little more hatred, what's the matter with that?