CHARLESTON, W. Va. A federal appeals court overturned transgender sports restrictions in West Virginia, ruling that it violates Title IX, the federal civil rights law that forbids sex-based prejudice in schools.
The 4th U.S. Circuit Court decision on Tuesday. A West Virginia law prohibiting transgender girls from participating in girls’ sports teams is blocked by the court of appeal.
The court ruled that the law may not be legally applied to a 13-year-old girl who has been taking puberty-blocking medicine and who has identified as a girl since she was in the second grade.
If the laws were to be upheld, the prosecutor had blocked the state’s attempt to remove Becky Pepper Jackson from her middle school track and field team in February 2023.
Judge Toby Heytens argued that having her make the decision between never competing in activities and playing just for boys’ teams was “no choice at all.”
The defendants can’t expect that B.P.J. will countermand her social transition, her medical treatment, and all the work she has done with her institutions, teachers, and mentors for nearly half her life by presenting herself to colleagues, mentors, and perhaps competitors as a boy,” Heytens wrote.
The American Civil Liberties Union, its West Virginia chapter, and LGBTQ rights advocacy group Lambda Legal, which filed a complaint in 2021 against the state and county board of education and their supervisors as defendants, were granted a favorable ruling on Tuesday. Republican Gov. A bill was already in place by Jim Justice earlier that month.
This is a significant victory for transgender West Virginians and the right of all children to play as they are, according to ACLU West Virginia attorney Joshua Block in a statement.
The jury determined that the girl’s status as a girl has been formally documented for more than five years, and that West Virginia’s birth certificate now lists her as a girl. She is prescribed progesterone hormone therapy as well as puberty-blocking treatment, according to the court. Since starting secondary school, she has participated only on girls’ athletic teams.
“B.P.J. has shown that applying the law to her may treat her worse than people who are also placed, deprive her of any meaningful athletic opportunities, and do so based on sex. That is all Title IX requires,” Heytens wrote.
West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, a Republican, said he was “deeply disappointed” in the decision.
I will continue to fight to protect Title IX. To ensure girls’ safety is assured and girls have a level playing field, the Attorney General continued, adding that we must continue to work to protect women’s sports. We are confident in the law’s validity and will use all means at our disposal to defend it.”
In recent years, sports participation has been one of the primary fronts in legal and legislative disputes involving transgender individuals. Most Republican-controlled states have enacted laws on participation, as well as restrictions on gender-affirming health care for minors. Additionally, some have restrictions on the types of locker rooms and bathrooms transgender individuals can use, especially in public spaces.
West Virginia is one of at least 24 states that prohibit transgender women and girls from participating in specific girls’ or boys’ sports.
The restrictions are in effect in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, and Wyoming.
In addition to West Virginia, courts have temporarily halted enforcement of the restrictions in Arizona, Idaho, and Utah. But the 2nd Circuit revived a challenge last year to Connecticut’s policy of allowing transgender girls to compete in girls’ sports, sending it back to a lower court without ruling on its merits.
Later this month, a restriction will take effect in Ohio.
The Biden administration had planned to issue new national Title IX rules, which address both school sexual assault and transgender athletes and prohibit discrimination based on gender in education. The department decided to split them into separate rules earlier this year, so the athletics concept is still pending.
