The ruling found that Idaho and West Virginia laws barring biological males from female athletic teams do not violate the Constitution or Title IX.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom
The Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld state laws barring ‘transgender’ biological males from competing on female school athletic teams, ruling that bans in Idaho and West Virginia do not violate the Constitution or Title IX.
The decision marks another major ruling involving transgender rights and school athletics. More than two dozen Republican-led states have enacted similar laws restricting participation by transgender female athletes, and the court’s decision is expected to affect those measures as well.
The court’s conservative majority ruled that the Idaho and West Virginia laws are legally permissible under both the Constitution and Title IX, the federal law that prohibits sex discrimination in education.
The ruling does not resolve separate lawsuits challenging laws and regulations in states such as Connecticut and California that allow transgender athletes to compete on teams consistent with their gender identity.
One of the cases involved 16-year-old Becky Pepper-Jackson, a high school sophomore in Bridgeport, West Virginia. Pepper-Jackson has taken puberty-blocking medication, has identified publicly as a girl since age 8 and has a West Virginia birth certificate recognizing her as female.
She is the only transgender person who has sought to compete in girls sports in West Virginia.
Pepper-Jackson began as a lower-ranking cross-country runner in middle school and later became a statewide champion in the shot put. She won last month’s West Virginia championship meet by two feet over the second-place finisher.
The Idaho case involved Lindsay Hecox, who sued after Idaho enacted the nation’s first state ban of its kind. Hecox sought the chance to try out for the women’s track and cross-country teams at Boise State University.
Her lawyer, Kathleen Hartnett, told the court during January arguments that Hecox did not make either team because “she was too slow,” though she later competed in club-level soccer and running.
Prominent female athletes weighed in on both sides of the dispute.
Tennis champion Martina Navratilova, swimmers Summer Sanders and Donna de Varona, and beach volleyball player Kerri Walsh Jennings supported state bans on transgender female athletes competing in female sports.
Soccer players Megan Rapinoe and Becky Sauerbrunn and basketball players Sue Bird and Breanna Stewart supported transgender athletes challenging the restrictions.
The Supreme Court previously ruled in 2020 that LGBTQ people are protected under a major federal civil rights law prohibiting sex discrimination in the workplace. In that decision, the court said “sex plays an unmistakable role” when employers punish transgender people for traits or behavior tolerated in others.
Last year, however, the court’s six conservative justices declined to apply similar reasoning when they upheld state bans on gender-affirming care for transgender minors.
States defending restrictions on transgender athletes argued that the workplace discrimination ruling should not be extended to Title IX sports cases.
Idaho Solicitor General Alan Hurst argued that the law was “necessary for fair competition because, where sports are concerned, men and women are obviously not the same.”
Lawyers for Pepper-Jackson argued that sex-based distinctions in sports may generally be permissible but should not apply to her because of the circumstances of her early transition and medical treatment.
In Hecox’s case, her lawyers asked the court to dismiss the case because she had said she would no longer seek to compete on women’s teams.
The issue has drawn national attention despite the small number of transgender athletes competing in school sports.
NCAA President Charlie Baker told Congress in 2024 that he was aware of only 10 transgender athletes among more than 500,000 students competing on college teams.
After President Donald Trump signed an executive order aimed at barring transgender women from women’s sports, the NCAA and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committees adopted policies banning transgender women from women’s sports.
Public opinion has generally favored restrictions. An Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll conducted in October 2025 found that about 6 in 10 U.S. adults strongly or somewhat favored requiring transgender children and teenagers to compete only on teams matching the sex they were assigned at birth. About 2 in 10 opposed that requirement, while about one-quarter did not express an opinion.
According to the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law, about 2.1 million adults in the United States, or 0.8%, identify as transgender. Among people ages 13 to 17, about 724,000, or 3.3%, identify as transgender.
The ruling leaves state bans in Idaho and West Virginia in place and is likely to shape future legal challenges over school athletics, Title IX and transgender participation in sports.
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