Arlington and Fairfax counties’ public school districts are suing the Department of Education in an effort to protect their federal funding from being frozen in retaliation for the school systems’ gender policies surrounding the use of bathrooms and locker rooms.

The lawsuits come after the Education Department requested Arlington Public Schools, Fairfax County Public Schools, and three other Northern Virginia school districts to change their policies that allow transgender students to use bathrooms and locker rooms that align with their gender identity, rather than their biological sex.

The school systems refused, and the Education Department responded by placing them on “high-risk” status, meaning the department will scrutinize their federal reimbursement requests.

In their complaints, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Arlington and Fairfax county schools are seeking to have that status reversed. The school districts say tens of millions of dollars for critical services for students are on the line.

“These federal funds are not abstract numbers on a spreadsheet; they represent vital support for our most vulnerable children. This funding supports our food and nutrition services, services for our students with disabilities, students from low-income families, and programs that promote teacher development and student achievement across the division,” Fairfax County Public Schools Superintendent Michelle Reid said in a letter addressed to staff and families.

“The DOE’s ‘high-risk’ designation unfairly harms tens of thousands of our students by threatening these essential services,” Reid continued.

FCPS said in a statement up to $167 million in federal funding has been essentially frozen.

In his letter to the Arlington Public Schools community, Superintendent Francisco Durán said the Education Department’s “high-risk” designation effectively halts $23 million in funding that the school district relies on.

That funding, Durán said, is mainly used to provide more than 8,000 low-income students with free meals and thousands of special needs students with counseling and other educational support.

In its complaint filed Friday, Arlington Public Schools asserts the Education Department’s funding freeze violates Title IX, the Administrative Procedures Act and the Spending Clause of the U.S. Constitution. The school system also said the department is incorrectly interpreting Title IX.

Fairfax County schools state, in its complaint also filed Friday, that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit’s ruling in Grimm v. Gloucester County School board binds the school system. In that decision, FCPS wrote, the Fourth Circuit ruled that the Equal Protection Clause and Title IX compel local school boards to provide students with access to facilities that correspond with their gender identity.

This week, Reid said in her letter that her school system reached out to the Education Department, “to address the impossible position that the DOE has placed on our school division — whether to violate a federal court ruling regarding the support of our transgender students or risk this critical funding. The DOE did not respond.”

Durán said he expects a judge to hear the case quickly and issue an order that will preserve federal funding.

WTOP has reached out to the Department of Education for comment.

The Washington Post first reported the lawsuit.

WTOP’s Scott Gelman contributed to this report.