The Supreme Court Is Skeptical of Trans Athletes’ Rights

Hecox began to undergo medical gender-transition treatments as a first-year student, including medication to suppress her natural testosterone levels. “Lindsay’s medical treatment rendered her eligible to participate under NCAA rules at the time, but H.B. 500 barred Lindsay from trying out for women’s track or cross-country teams,” her lawyers told the court in their brief. (The NCAA has changed its policies since the brief was filed.)

The other case, West Virginia v. B.P.J., involved a teenage transgender girl who sought to play on her high school’s cross-country team. (The courts refer to her by her initials because she is a minor.) In 2021, however, West Virginia followed a wave of other states by passing a law that forbade “biological boys” from playing on high school or college teams designated for girls. While state lawmakers claimed they were protecting women’s sports, B.P.J.’s lawyers noted that the law effectively banned a single student—their client, who had transitioned as a minor—in West Virginia from participating in sports.

“B.P.J. wants to play sports for the same reasons most kids do: to have fun and make friends as part of a team,” her lawyers told the justices in their brief. “Her experiences on sports teams have given her the opportunity to build teamwork, confidence, and friendship while cultivating her work ethic. She feels free and fully herself when she is out on the field.” West Virginia does not have coed teams, and joining a boys’ team would be “isolating, stigmatizing, and publicly humiliating,” they explained. The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals sided with her in 2022 on Title IX grounds.