The U.S. Department of Agriculture has clarified its guidance for participants in a free school lunch program, stating that faith-based schools can seek religious exemptions to federal restrictions that include barring discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.
The clarification, delivered via a USDA memo dated Aug. 12, comes in the wake of controversy involving the National School Lunch Program, a federal initiative that provides meals for tens of millions of children at public and nonprofit private schools nationwide.
This summer, at least one school expressed concern that participating in the food program would make the institution beholden to nondiscrimination provisions that are part of Title IX, a measure passed in 1972 aimed at ensuring equal opportunity at educational institutions. While the Trump administration narrowly interpreted Title IX to apply only to gender assigned at birth, the Biden administration, much like the Obama administration, uses a broader interpretation of the provision that includes baring discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.
Source: USDA exempts religious schools from nondiscrimination rules to keep kids fed