HR-2555-119
Placed on the Union Calendar, Calendar No. 682.
Sponsored by Erin Houchin (R-IN)
What it does
This bill would amend the Higher Education Act to prohibit colleges receiving federal funds from taking adverse action against students or single-sex social organizations (fraternities, sororities, or similar clubs) based on their single-sex membership practices. It would bar institutions from requiring students to waive these protections, retaliating against members, or imposing recruitment restrictions on single-sex groups that aren't imposed on other organizations, while still allowing colleges to decline official recognition and to discipline students for misconduct or, at private religious institutions, incompatibility with religious mission.
Who benefits
Students who wish to join or lead single-sex fraternities and sororities, national fraternity and sorority organizations, and alumni networks tied to these groups. Religious and traditionally single-sex social organizations that have faced institutional pressure to admit other sexes or curtail recruitment also benefit.
Who is hurt
Colleges and universities lose some authority to regulate student organizations' recruitment practices and to penalize single-sex groups, potentially complicating campus efforts to address hazing, exclusion, or Title IX-related concerns tied to single-sex organizations. Students excluded from these organizations because of their sex, and advocates for coeducational campus policies, may see this as limiting institutional tools to promote inclusion; transgender and nonbinary students may be affected by the bill's biology-based definition of sex used to determine eligibility.
Supporters argue
Supporters argue that single-sex fraternities and sororities have long been recognized under Title IX's own exemption for such organizations, and that colleges have increasingly pressured or penalized these groups without a clear federal check on that authority. They contend the bill simply codifies students' freedom to associate in organizations of their choosing, consistent with existing legal exemptions, while still letting schools discipline actual misconduct.
Opponents argue
Opponents argue that the bill would strip colleges of the flexibility to manage student organizations and campus culture, including addressing concerns about exclusion, hazing, or discrimination tied to single-sex groups. They contend the bill's rigid biological definition of sex could be used to exclude transgender students from organizations matching their gender identity, and that conditioning federal funding this way pressures institutional decision-making that has traditionally been left to individual schools.
Constitutional context
Congress is using its Spending Clause power (Art. I, §8, cl. 1) to attach conditions to federal higher education funds, a framework governed by the five-part test in South Dakota v. Dole (1987); the bill's freedom-of-association rationale also draws on associational rights recognized in cases like Boy Scouts of America v. Dale (2000), which upheld a private organization's right to control its membership criteria.
Checks and balances
Congress would set funding conditions that the Department of Education enforces through Title IV compliance, while institutions and organizations could challenge enforcement actions in federal court under the Higher Education Act and constitutional associational-rights doctrine.
Historical precedent
Title IX (1972) already contains a statutory exemption for single-sex social fraternities and sororities, which this bill builds on by adding explicit nonretaliation and funding-condition enforcement mechanisms.