The New York Times is unhappy with me and the State of Texas for challenging yet another of President Obama’s sweeping directives. This one would require all school districts across the country to permit transgender students to use the bathroom facilities of their choice. The editorial board of the paper calls the president’s order a “common-sense approach” and claims that our lawsuit against the administration amounts to “legal assaults . . . based on bigotry.” This is nonsense.

It is certainly correct that Texas and 23 other states are waging a massive legal battle against the president’s latest edict. Yet for some reason the New York Times editors refuse to acknowledge what this legal fight is actually about: the Constitution. It should surprise no one that the New York Times has its own agenda — but it is still frustrating when it blatantly mischaracterizes the facts and the law to fit its own narrative.

Control over intimate facilities in schools has always been left to the states. In Texas, for example, state law says that decisions over who uses what facilities will be made by local school districts — most of which have chosen to decide such weighty issues on a case-by-case basis. The states have never ceded this control to the federal government, yet President Obama is now trying to seize it through the use of Title IX — and he is violating the Constitution in the process.

Congress passed Title IX in 1972 to forbid sex discrimination in schools. Under Title IX, “sex” means an individual’s biological sex at birth. This should not be a controversial conclusion. For decades, across multiple federal statutes, Congress has consistently used the term “sex” to refer to an individual’s status as male or female as determined by the individual’s biological sex at birth. Congress made the deliberate decision for Title IX to address sex but not gender identity.

EDITORIAL: The Obama Administration Rewrites Title IX

Make no mistake: Congress knows the difference between sex and gender identity, and it knows how to write a law to address both sex and gender identity. Recently, Congress amended the Violence Against Women Act and the Hate Crimes Act to address both sex discrimination and gender-identity discrimination. In Title IX, however, Congress has chosen to address only sex discrimination — not gender-identity discrimination. In fact, Congress has repeatedly rejected attempts to amend Title IX to include gender-identity discrimination, even as recently as 2015.

President Obama is apparently unhappy that “gender identity” is not included in Title IX. He has the right to be unhappy, and he doesn’t have to settle for just being unhappy, either. The president is a powerful guy. He can do a lot of big, important things. He can ask Congress to pass a bill amending Title IX. He can go on TV and urge the American people to elect representatives who will amend Title IX. He can beg, plead, cajole, and expend all the political capital he wants to try to get Congress to change the law.

What he cannot do is take out his pen and rewrite the law himself. But that is precisely what President Obama has attempted to do.

RELATED: President Obama’s Transgender Proclamation Is Far Broader and More Dangerous than You Think

The president is marshaling the power of his administrative state to enforce a version of Title IX that exists only in the dreams of the president and his supporters. The Constitution does not give the president that power. Under the Constitution, Congress writes the laws, the president faithfully executes them, and the courts interpret them.

Deep down, the president knows this. In 2014, in a moment of welcome honesty, he told his supporters exactly that: “I know some people want me to bypass Congress and change the laws on my own. . . . But that’s not how our system works. That’s not how our democracy functions. That’s not how our Constitution is written.”

#related#That is the heart of the matter. Will government officials abide by their oaths to uphold the Constitution and the laws as written? Or will they simply do whatever they want? This is not a bigotry issue. This is not a partisan issue. If you like the president’s supposedly “common-sense” positions today, remember that there will come a day when we have a president whose policies you despise. Defend the Constitution today and it will protect you and your children tomorrow.

As for me and the State of Texas, we will abide by the Constitution and take any steps necessary to defend it. And if we get to bask in the indignant fury of the New York Times editorial board in the process, well, so be it.