Schools Reported Gender-Based Bullying. The Education Department Hid The Numbers.

WASHINGTON—The Education Department has released a major survey of civil rights in nearly every public school while withholding every figure related to nonbinary students and bullying based on gender identity, allowing the government to collect the facts without exposing the public to them.

Schools supplied the information for the 2023-24 Civil Rights Data Collection, when the nonbinary category became mandatory for some data elements. In the public file, an Associated Press analysis found that each affected column now carries a code reading “Suppressed in Compliance with Executive Order.” The data survived the survey and then encountered policy.

The suppression also covers allegations of harassment or bullying based on gender identity, whether districts had written policies against that conduct and links to those policies. The department said it was legally obligated to follow President Donald Trump’s inauguration-day order defining sex as only male or female. It described the release as consistent with its duty to protect women and girls, a mission now served by declining to show how some other students said they were treated.

The survey exists so the Office for Civil Rights can collect information needed to enforce federal civil-rights laws. Department materials say data may ordinarily be suppressed for quality or privacy. This time the numbers were removed under a separate code created for an executive order, giving researchers a clear record of why they cannot see the record.

America’s schools have therefore completed the paperwork. Parents, educators and policymakers may consult every permitted answer, while the prohibited answers remain safely inside the government that asked for them.