EXCLUSIVE: An education watchdog group has taken action against the University of Wisconsin–Madison by filing a civil rights complaint with the Department of Education. The complaint accuses the university of violating Title IX, which prohibits discrimination based on sex in educational institutions.

Filed on Wednesday by Defending Education, the complaint alleges that Wisconsin’s leading public university, which serves 50,000 students, is disregarding anti-discrimination laws. The group claims the university’s policies prioritize the needs of transgender students at the expense of biological women.

The controversy centers around the university’s “UW-6009: Inclusive Facilities Policy and Procedures for All Buildings.”

Bascom Hall, a prominent building on the University of Wisconsin–Madison campus, is a notable landmark in Madison, Wisconsin. (Kevin Koeppen/Getty Images)

The university’s policy states, “In alignment with our commitment to nondiscrimination and inclusion, all students, staff, faculty, and visitors have the right to use facilities in which they feel safest and most comfortable, without facing harassment or inquiry, irrespective of their gender expression or sex assigned at birth.” It further clarifies that “[p]atrons may use the gendered restroom that is safest and most comfortable for them in all UW–Madison facilities.”

Defending Education says the policy guarantees biological men the ability to enter all private female spaces, including bathrooms and locker rooms, on campus, and that women have little recourse.

“If women are uncomfortable sharing multi-stall restrooms with biological males, the University instructs them to use a limited number of gender inclusive, single-occupancy restrooms instead,” Defending Education said on their website accompanying a copy of the complaint. “Forcing women to give up the private spaces and facilities that Title IX guarantees is a violation of the spirit, history, and plain text of that law.”

The entrance to the agriculture building at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. (youngryand/Getty Images)

In its letter to the DOE, Defending Education notes that Title IX extends to all facilities within a school that receives federal funding.

“UW-Madison’s restroom and locker room policy appears to violate Title IX and the Equal Protection Clause,” the letter says. “Accordingly, we ask that the Department promptly investigate all the allegations in this complaint, act swiftly to remedy unlawful policies and practices, and order appropriate relief.”

Sarah Parshall Perry, vice president and legal fellow at Defending Education, told Fox News Digital that this is the second civil rights complaint the group has filed against the Wisconsin school for “discriminatory practices” in less than a year.

President Donald Trump speaks with Secretary of Education Linda McMahon during an executive order signing ceremony in the Roosevelt Room of the White House on July 31, 2025. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

“The university’s policies are breathtaking in the vastness of their transgender preferencing, leaving biological females at the university without recourse, and in patent violation of Title IX—a law passed explicitly to secure educational equality for women, and for no other purpose,” she said.

“The University is on the wrong side of the law, and likely knows it. Now, the United States Department of Education knows it too.”

Read the full complaint: