Supreme Court Upholds State Bans on Boys in Girls’ Sports

The court said Idaho, West Virginia laws do not violate the Constitution or Title IX by keeping boys out of girls’ sports.

Defenders of female sports categories gather in front of the U.S. Supreme Court as they wait for rulings in Washington, on June 30, 2026. Today, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a ban on birthright citizenship, upheld state restrictions on transgender athletes in female sports, and eliminated federal limits on coordinated campaign spending. Alex Wong/Getty Images

The Supreme Court on June 30 upheld West Virginia and Idaho laws prohibiting boys in girls’ sports.

“Title IX allows schools to provide separate women’s and men’s sports teams defined by biological sex, and West Virginia has permissibly maintained female sports for biological females consistent with Title IX,” Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote in the majority opinion.

The decision is expected to ripple through other states by providing legal guidance for legislatures that address the issue.

The cases, known as West Virginia v. B.P.J. and Little v. Hecox, arose out of a federal appeals court ruling that the state’s law violated the 14th Amendment. More specifically, they said that the law violated the equal protection clause by classifying individuals based on their sex and “transgender status.”

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit also said West Virginia’s law violated Title IX of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits sex-based discrimination in federally funded education.