The Supreme Court issued a landmark decision on June 30, upholding state laws that blocked males from competing in female sports.
Its ruling came in response to two cases, West Virginia v. B.P.J. and Hecox v. Little, questioning whether the bans constituted illegal forms of discrimination. More specifically, transgender athletes argued that West Virginia and Idaho had violated the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment by classifying athletes based on sex and other characteristics.
The court disagreed and also rejected the idea that these laws violate Title IX, a federal law that prohibits sex-based discrimination in education. Instead, it said, Title IX allowed states to segregate sports teams based on sex. The court unanimously ruled in favor of the states on some issues, but some of the justices dissented on whether the plaintiffs’ rights were violated.
Here are the main takeaways from the decision:
Kavanaugh Defends States’ Interest in Protecting Female Athletes
Writing for the majority, Justice Brett Kavanaugh acknowledged that the laws classified, or separated, students based on sex and therefore raised questions about whether they were constitutional.
However, he said that states were justified in making those classifications because of concerns about fairness and safety for female athletes.
He also emphasized that female athletes would lose opportunities to boys without the laws.
“Sports are highly competitive and generally zero sum. … Every athlete who makes a team takes a roster spot from another athlete,” he said.
Attorneys had argued that the states also classified individuals based on “transgender status” and therefore raised constitutional concerns. The majority, however, rejected this argument.
Title IX Allows Sex Segregation in Sports
Tuesday’s ruling gave definitive answers to questions about Title IX that have been swirling around for years.
BPJ, the athlete suing West Virginia, agreed with the concept of women-only sports but argued that the state’s law violated Title IX. Attorneys said it was “unreasonable” to exclude men—who identify as women—from competing with women.
Kavanaugh disagreed, saying “inherent” differences between men and women, risk of injury, and fairness in competition justified segregation under Title IX.
Kavanaugh also said the court was “acutely aware” of the difficulties faced by youth with gender dysphoria.
“No student-athlete on either side of the issue, whether a biological female or transgender, deserves to be ostracized or vilified,” he wrote.
But he added that the justices had to consider “the effects on girls who are forced to compete against biological males in sports.”
Justices Debate Biological Basis of Sex, Gender
Justice Clarence Thomas, in a brief concurring opinion, said the case is about unchangeable biology, not shifting gender identity.
“A man does not have a legal right to compete against women just because he believes that he is a woman. … Men and boys with gender dysphoria are not women or girls, even if they believe that they are,” he wrote.
“Sex is an immutable ‘biological’ characteristic … it is binary; and ’man‘ and ’woman,‘ ’boy‘ and ’girl,' are the terms that correspond to adults and children of each sex.”
Gender dysphoria, he added, was a changeable characteristic that was the “object of psychiatric treatment.”
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, in a solo dissent, took issue with the court’s finding that “sex” in Title IX referred only to biological sex.
“Because West Virginia’s law forces B. P. J. to live—in this case, to play—as a boy though she is a girl, it might well run afoul of Title IX properly construed,” she wrote.
Jackson, during her Senate confirmation hearing in 2022, refused to define the term “woman” because, she said, she was “not a biologist.” In her dissent, she suggested that one’s sex shouldn’t be limited to what they’re “assigned at birth.”
Dissent Says More Science Needed
Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Jackson partly agreed with the majority opinion. They found that the laws were based on sex, not transgender status, and that BPJ’s Title IX claim failed.
But in their dissent, they took issue with the majority’s handling of the equal protection claim. They said the majority had not thoroughly considered scientific evidence purporting to show that males like BPJ and Hecox didn’t have a real advantage over females.
Sotomayor said the case should have been kicked back down to lower courts for “further factfinding.” She wasn’t predicting the outcome of that inquiry, but said the majority decision erred by ruling without it.
LGBT advocacy groups also decried the ruling.
Noreen Farrell, executive director of Equal Rights Advocates, in an email to The Epoch Times, said the decision might inadvertently affect biological women.
“To comply with state laws, schools and athletic associations must identify and exclude transgender athletes from participating in school sports, and in the process, will inevitably rely on stereotypes—singling out girls with short hair or an athletic build, or those who are simply ‘too good’ at their sport,” it said.
