UCLA Rejects Trump Demands To Capitulate To Anti-Trans Policies—For Now

The university has refused to bow to the President’s sweeping list of anti-transgender demands—bucking a growing trend of large universities that have caved to similar pressure.

UCLA // Beyond My Ken // Wikimedia Commons

UCLA Chancellor Julio Frenk and UC President James B. Milliken have appeared to reject Trump administration demands tied to the restoration of federal funding. The demands reportedly include a large monetary settlement, an end to diversity, equity, and inclusion practices, and a rollback of transgender rights on campus. That rollback would ban transgender students from participating in sports, living in dorms, and likely using bathrooms consistent with their gender identity, as well as halt the provision of gender-affirming care by the university’s hospital and medical school—demands similar to those made of other prestigious schools that have capitulated to Trump.

“The University of California just received a document from the Department of Justice and is reviewing it. Earlier this week, we offered to engage in good faith dialogue with the Department to protect the University and its critical research mission. As a public university, we are stewards of taxpayer resources and a payment of this scale would completely devastate our country’s greatest public university system as well as inflict great harm on our students and all Californians. Americans across this great nation rely on the vital work of UCLA and the UC system for technologies and medical therapies that save lives, grow the U.S. economy, and protect our national security,” reads the statement from Milliken.

According to CNN, the list of demands was extensive. They include a ban on transgender participation in sports, regardless of medical transition status. The demands also call for “single-sex housing,” which would presumably bar transgender students from dorms matching their lived and often legal gender. Though not reported by CNN, similar demands made of other universities have also led to bans on transgender people using bathrooms aligned with their gender identity.

One demand called for ending the provision of gender-affirming care across the entire UC medical system, which serves thousands of transgender patients in California. The loss of such care would be devastating. In recent months, several hospitals across the United States have stopped providing transgender healthcare to people under the age of 19, capitulating to Trump administration demands—often in violation of state equality laws. One such hospital was Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, where the loss of care forced a significant number of patients to seek treatment elsewhere.

News that UCLA was refusing to cede to Trump administration demands set it apart from other universities that have taken a different approach, throwing transgender students under the bus to secure federal funding. In recent weeks, Columbia University signed a similar agreement that included a sports ban and a dorm ban for transgender students. Penn agreed to vacate wins by transgender athletes in sporting competitions. Most troubling of all was Brown University’s more recent agreement, which included all of the above as well as a ban on transgender students in bathrooms—a policy that appears to violate civil rights protections in Rhode Island. Brown is one of the first major universities in a blue state to adopt a transgender bathroom ban. For now, UCLA will not join these universities in capitulating.

Governor Gavin Newsom appeared to confirm that the university system would not capitulate, at least in the short term, stating, “Donald Trump has weaponized the DOJ (Department of Justice) to kneecap America’s #1 public university system — freezing medical and science funding until @UCLA pays his $1 billion ransom. California won’t bow to Trump’s disgusting political extortion.” Newsom himself has pushed anti-trans policies, including sports segregation/ban policies, and has spread misinformation about transgender medical care with conservative podcasters. It remains unclear whether his opposition to the UCLA negotiations with the federal government is rooted in the anti-trans aspects of the demands or in the large fine the government is attempting to impose on the system.

Though the demands appear to be rejected for now, multiple statements indicate that legal counsel is reviewing them and determining next steps. The state is currently engaged in a legal battle in which the freezing of 300 federal grants over transgender and diversity policies was found to violate the legal rights of those states and institutions within them. In that case, the government is arguing that a suspension is not the same as a termination and therefore does not violate the ruling.

Editor’s note: A previous version of this article mentioned a transgender volleyball player. This player went to SJSU, not UCLA.