The Trump administration on Thursday threatened to pull federal funding from K-12 districts and states if they don’t certify within 10 days that they do not have unlawful diversity, equity and inclusion practices.

States have to sign and submit a certification form asserting that each of their districts do not give advantages to people based on their race, according to a memo sent to education officials by the U.S. Department of Education. The form itself warns that states or individual schools could be subject to litigation or be forced to pay back funds if they’re found to violate the law.

The directive is the latest in a series of aggressive orders the Trump administration has issued through the department — which it intends to dismantle — to drag the education sector in line with conservative orthodoxy around race and gender.

“Federal financial assistance is a privilege, not a right,” acting Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Craig Trainor said in a statement. Too many schools, Trainor asserted, use “DEI programs to discriminate against one group of Americans to favor another based on identity characteristics,” which he said violates anti-discrimination law.

The memo sent a “shock wave” through the education world Thursday, said Jonathan Collins, co-director of the politics and education program at Columbia University’s Teachers College. He sees the certification form as a green light to let the federal government comb through districts’ policies, curricular units and other activities to “essentially plant red flags when they see issues.”

“This is quite unprecedented,” Collins said.

While no school has lost federal funding over civil rights violations in decades — not since 1990, according to Education Week — education experts believe the Trump administration is getting closer to making that a reality for those that do not follow its directives.

The Education Department told Maine earlier this week that it may ask the Department of Justice this month to start the legal process of cutting federal dollars from the state’s education agency over policies regarding transgender student athletes. And federal agencies have frozen grants to Ivy League universities over accusations they have not sufficiently addressed antisemitism on campus.

“Is this what the Trump administration calls local control?” Keri Rodrigues, president of the National Parents Union, an advocacy organization, said in a statement. “You can’t say you’re giving control back to states and then dictate how they run their schools.”

Diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, is an umbrella term widely used in academic and workplace settings to refer to a range of activities or policies meant to level the playing field for people from historically disadvantaged backgrounds. However, critics contend DEI has been used to inappropriately boost certain students or employees based solely on their race or gender. Conservative activists began to attack DEI in recent years after accusing K-12 schools of teaching an academic concept called critical race theory. 

Michael Pillera, director of the educational opportunities project at the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, said even if the administration doesn’t pull funding, these directives will likely cause educators to back away from lawful activities to avoid creating a target for the Trump administration.

“The letter in no way changed the law,” said Pillera, who worked in the department’s civil rights office until he resigned last month. “All that changed is the department’s behavior and its desire to intimidate and chill activities and school districts.”

States and schools already have to agree that they will not violate federal civil rights laws if they accept federal funding under Title I, which helps schools with high numbers of impoverished students. The new form attempts to go further, drawing on an earlier directive from the department, sent Feb. 14, that gave schools 14 days to stop using race in admissions, hiring, financial aid, discipline, grading and other aspects of school life.

The American Civil Liberties Union and the National Education Association are currently suing the department, arguing that the Feb. 14 letter oversteps the government’s legal authority and threatens educators’ First Amendment rights. The case is still pending, and the department asked this week for an extension until April 11 to file a response, according to court records.

The Education Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Thursday’s memo referenced a frequently asked questions document it issued in February that elaborated on potential violations of anti-discrimination laws. It said the department would consider the facts and circumstances of each case to determine violations, and balance those concerns against First Amendment protections.

Liz King, senior director of education policy at the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, an advocacy group, said the latest directive could become a “gotcha game” where violations are decided based on how they comport with Trump’s agenda, rather than legal precedent.

“Of course there’s a deadline,” King said. “This is only the latest fire drill in a campaign of chaos and fear.”

Several international students at Colorado universities have had their visas revoked by the Department of Homeland Security, according to the universities.

Between the University of Colorado and Colorado State University, 10 students have had their F-1 visa, which allows foreign students to study at universities in America, rescinded as of Tuesday evening.

The University of Colorado said four international students were impacted. Meanwhile, six students at Colorado State University had their visas terminated, according to the school.

“We are focused on supporting the success of all of our students, including international students. Each one of our students are seeking to advance their careers and the lives of their families, and we understand the anxieties that visa revocations cause to impacted students,” the University of Colorado said in a statement.

The school added, “We urge any international student with questions or concerns to reach out to their campus’ international student office.”

Colorado State University said the “affected students are advised to immediately contact the embassy of their home country” and “we are working with our state and federal elected officials to ensure that our students are informed of all their options.”

The universities declined to provide additional information or the students’ identity, citing privacy reasons.

The revocation of nearly a dozen visas in Colorado comes after a wave of high-profile arrests of international students across the country in March. The Trump administration has justified its decision to deport the students based on a provision in immigration law. It allows the secretary of state to deport someone if it is determined that the person “would have serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.” 

In March, Mahmoud Khalil, a student who took part in the protests at Columbia University, was apprehended by federal immigration officials in New York for allegedly leading activities “aligned to Hamas,” which the United States has designated a terrorist organization.

Another student at Tufts University, Rumeysa Ozturk, was grabbed off the street by federal officers in plain clothes while on her way to break her Ramadan fast with friends over allegations that she “engaged in activities in support of Hamas.”

A year ago, Ozturk co-wrote a student newspaper op-ed criticizing the university’s response to demands that it “acknowledge the Palestinian genocide” and “divest from companies with direct or indirect ties to Israel.”

Authorities also detained Badar Khan Suri, a graduate student from India, who was teaching at Georgetown University on a student visa.

Assistant DHS Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said Suri was “actively spreading Hamas propaganda and promoting antisemitism on social media” and had “close connections to a known or suspected terrorist, who is a senior advisor to Hamas.”

Khalil, Ozturk and Suri do not face known criminal charges. 

Last week, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the State Department had revoked 300 or more student visas.

“It might be more than 300 at this point. We do it every day. Every time I find one of these lunatics, I take away their visas,” he said. “I think it’s crazy to invite students into your country that are coming onto your campus and destabilizing it. We’re just not going to have it. So we’ll revoke your visa.”

Rubio added, “Once your visa is revoked, you’re illegally in the country and you have to leave.”

A transgender teacher in Texas resigned on Monday, less than a week after a state lawmaker called for her to be fired over a social media video in which she talks about feeling supported by her students.

“I am heartbroken,” said Rosie Sandri, who taught sophomore English at Red Oak High School, just south of the Dallas metro area, for three years. She said she has wanted to be a teacher since she was 5 years old. “When I signed that resignation, it felt like my dream was being taken away from me.

Sandri, 33, came out as a trans woman about seven months ago and said her colleagues at school and the Red Oak Independent School District were very supportive. She said she never got up in front of her class and came out, but instead just started dressing differently. When students noticed and asked if they should call her by a different name or use different pronouns, she told them they could call her “whatever they were comfortable with.”

She did tell them that she preferred she/her pronouns, but added, “If you don’t agree with that, or you feel uncomfortable with that, you’re not going to hurt my feelings by calling me whatever you want.”

After she came out, Sandri started sharing videos of her experiences as a trans woman and teacher on TikTok. She said she filmed some of the videos in her classroom after school hours. She had about 150 followers prior to last week. 

Last Wednesday, the social media account Libs of TikTok, which has millions of followers and singles out LGBTQ people and their employers for promoting inclusivity, shared one of Sandri’s TikTok videos in which she talks about gender euphoria, or the positive feelings trans people experience when their gender identity and expression align. 

“At school today, I’m surrounded by kids, I teach sophomores, and I have these 15-, 16-year-olds who are completely on board, who when I told them I had changed my pronouns, jumped right into it,” Sandri said in the March 18 video. “They call me ‘ma’am.’ They call me ‘Miss.’ They use my correct pronouns and know my correct name, and it is incredibly affirming.” 

In its post about Sandri, Libs of TikTok used her previous legal name, a practice called “deadnaming” that is widely considered offensive among the trans community, and also misgendered her and asked, “Would you feel comfortable with this person teaching your kid?” The account also shared a screenshot of one of Sandri’s posts about the different kinds of LGBTQ Pride flags, saying she was “pushing” the content on her public TikTok where students can follow her. 

State Rep. Brian Harrison, who represents Red Oak, where the school is located, shared Libs of TikTok’s post on X and demanded that Sandri be “immediately terminated.”

“Public schools (and the property taxes that fund them) are for education … not leftist indoctrination!” Harrison said. 

Chaya Raichik, the far-right activist who runs the Libs of TikTok account, did not return a request for comment.

Harrison said he is “proud to have helped deliver this victory to protect Texas students.”

“Public schools are for education, not indoctrination,” he said in an emailed statement. “Any teacher who claims to get ‘gender euphoria’ from their minor students and teaches them that boys can become girls should be terminated immediately.”

Sandri said she never taught her students about transitioning, and Harrison did not return a request for additional comment about whether he believes trans educators are teaching their students about transitioning just by being openly transgender.

Sandri said that she was out sick last Wednesday, when Libs of TikTok initially shared her video, but that she started receiving threats and harassment to her personal and school email accounts and on social media shortly after.

That same day, she said, she called the human resources department at Red Oak Independent School District, and the deputy superintendent told her the school had received threats as well. She said the deputy superintendent told her she would be placed on administrative leave for two days while the school investigated.

On Monday, she said she came to an agreement with the school that she would resign. She said that she can’t discuss the details of the conversation as part of the agreement, and that the school didn’t tell her she had violated any policy. 

In an email sent to school staff Monday and obtained by NBC News, Beth Trimble, the chief communications officer for the district, reminded educators of the district’s social media policy. 

“Your freedom of speech is not free of consequences if it results in a disruption of your ability to do your job,” the email said. It also directed staff to refrain from posting during school and work hours. 

In an email to NBC News, Trimble said the message sent to staff on Monday was not related to Sandri’s resignation. She did not answer questions about whether Sandri violated any of the district’s policies, Sandri’s account of events or whether the school asked Sandri to resign.

“I decided yesterday that my best option was to resign for the safety of myself and even for the safety of the school,” Sandri said, adding that she doesn’t hold any ill will against the school or district, which were supportive throughout her transition. 

“I was out [as transgender] for seven months, and parents, staff, admin, nobody had a problem,” she said. “I wasn’t causing a disruption. It was not people in the school or directly in the community that were causing a problem. It was these outside people.”

Libs of TikTok has repeatedly posted about teachers who have shared LGBTQ-inclusive content on social media, igniting harassment against those teachers and their schools. Last year, an Oklahoma teacher who performed in drag outside of work resigned after Libs of TikTok posted about him and the local superintendent subsequently called for him to be fired.

Monday, March 31, the day Sandri resigned, was coincidentally Trans Day of Visibility, an annual awareness day dedicated to celebrating trans people’s accomplishments and acknowledging the violence and discrimination the community faces. It was Sandri’s first Trans Day of Visibility as an out trans woman. 

People who said their children were in Sandri’s class commented on her post about her resignation saying they supported her. One person said Sandri was one of her son’s favorite teachers.

Sandri said she’s unsure whether she’ll be able to get another job as a teacher in Texas due to Harrison’s post and the public attention she’s received. As a result, she said she’s considering taking legal action against Libs of TikTok and people she said disparaged her and threatened the school. Libs of TikTok posted about Sandri’s resignation, calling it a “big win.” 

“My message to Libs of TikTok is, ‘You picked the wrong one,’” Sandri said. “The whole community stands behind me, and they don’t care, and I am lucky enough to have that privilege that a lot of trans people don’t have. So my message to everyone is, ‘Don’t just make this about me. Go out there and help the trans people and the LGBTQIA community, because there are Black and brown trans people, there are trans youth, there are gay and lesbian people who are having their right to marriage threatened right now. Go out there and help these people.”