Trump officials cut California sex-education funds over gender identity references

The Trump administration has terminated a grant that provided millions of dollars for a California sex education program after the state refused to remove all references to gender identity, transgender people and nonbinary people from its curriculum.

Advocates fear more states could lose more money in a burgeoning war between the Trump administration and supporters of comprehensive sex ed.

In June, the federal Administration for Children and Families warned California that it had 60 days to remove the references from the curriculum for the state’s Personal Responsibility Education Program (Prep), a federally funded sex-ed program that aims to prevent pregnancy and childhood STIs. It argued that such references were outside the program’s scope.

On Tuesday, California notified the Trump administration that it would not change its Prep curriculum, arguing that the materials were medically accurate, necessary to help prepare young people for the complexities of adult relationships and had already been approved by the Administration for Children and Families. Moreover, the letter argued, its materials were in line with the law, while the administration’s threat was not.

Government records indicate that California’s Prep grant was worth roughly $6m, although

Reuters reported that California now stands to lose a total of about $12m in federal funding. The Administration for Children and Families did not immediately reply to a request for clarification.

“California’s refusal to comply with federal law and remove egregious gender ideology from federally funded sex-ed materials is unacceptable,” Andrew Gradison, the acting assistant secretary at the Administration for Children and Families, said in a statement.

“Accountability is coming for every state that uses federal funds to teach children delusional gender ideology.”

Examples listed in the June letter included a middle-school lesson plan stating that “there are also people who don’t identify as boys or girls, but rather as transgender or gender queer. This means that even if they were called a boy or a girl at birth and may have body parts that are typically associated with being a boy or a girl, on the inside, they feel differently.”

Another example was from a high school lesson: “Remind students that some men are born with female anatomy, some women are born with male anatomy.”

In total, the Trump administration distributes about $75m each year to more than 50 states, territories, tribes and organizations to teach Prep to students. It has demanded that all recipients of Prep money turn over their curricula, from teachers’ manuals to PowerPoint presentations to parental consent forms, for a “medical accuracy review”.

The future of other federally funded sex ed programs may also be in doubt. The Trump administration has also informed recipients of funding for the $101m Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program (TPPP) that their curricula cannot include information about gender identity or diversity, equity and inclusion.

Experts and advocates worry that the federal government will increasingly weaponize sex ed funding to strangle efforts not only to teach young people about LGBTQ+ rights and issues, but also to undermine comprehensive sex ed writ large.

“It’s an inappropriate use of federal authority,” said Lisa MF Andersen, a historian who co-authored the book Touchy Subject: The History and Philosophy of Sex Education. She could not think of any precedent for the Trump administration’s actions.

“It’s a really weirdly political method to use – to try to use funding instead of trying to use legislation,” she said. “A lot of these things should be left up to Congress.”

During Donald Trump’s first term, his administration abruptly informed dozens of TPPP recipients that their grants would end years earlier than planned. Courts later ruled that Trump’s actions were unlawful.

Although sex ed policy is largely set at the local and state level in the US, presidential administrations still hold enormous sway over it because of their ability to pour billions of dollars into the kinds of programs that they prefer. Project 2025, the famous playbook of conservative policies written by the thinktank Heritage Foundation, urges federal agencies to specifically increase their scrutiny of PREP and TPPP “so that they do not promote abortion or high-risk sexual behavior among adolescents”. The playbook also recommends that these programs’ grant money should be given to curricula that prioritizes “sexual risk avoidance”, or abstinence-only-until-marriage sex ed.

The federal government already maintains a separate grant program, known as the Title V State Sexual Risk Avoidance Education Program, that devotes about $50m annually to abstinence-only sex ed. Research has repeatedly found that abstinence-only sex ed has failed to persuade people to avoid premarital sex.

The California department of public health did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the state’s defunding.

But Jorge Reyes Salinas, communications director for the LGBTQ+ civil rights organization Equality California, said that stripping California of funding would have long-lasting consequences for young people.

“Studies consistently show us that LGBTQ+ students, especially trans and nonbinary youth, face higher rates of bullying, harassment and suicide. Especially now, we’re seeing those numbers skyrocket,” Reyes Salinas said. “Inclusive education reduces stigma and saves lives.”