On Monday (4 May), the Trump administration’s Department of Educationannounced it has opened an investigation into historic women’s university, Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, over a possible violation of Title IX due to the school’s trans-inclusive acceptance policy.

This investigation is the latest in rapidly increasing efforts from the Trump administration to restrict trans people in the arena of higher education across the country, following Trump’s January 2025 executive order defining gender as sex assigned at birth.

Within this 2025 order, trans-inclusive interpretations of Title IX are considered to be harmful to women.

The Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights will proceed to evaluate if Smith College violated Title IX by “allowing biological males into women’s intimate spaces”.

Smith College told CNN in a 5 May response that the school is “is fully committed to its institutional values, including compliance with civil rights laws”.

Smith College has implemented broad acceptance of trans women since the implementation of a 2015 policy, which many women’s institutions at the same level also currently follow.

Their online admissions page currently details that all students who self-identify as women are welcome to apply, including “cis, trans, and nonbinary women”.