West Virginia, Idaho ask Supreme Court to protect women’s sports

The states this week filed separate petitions with the nation’s highest court asking justices to review state laws that would protect women and girls from having to compete with male athletes. The Alliance Defending Freedom legal organization and several female athletes joined state officials in submitting the requests. The petitions are the latest in a string of legal efforts to prevent a Biden administration rule from expanding the executive branch’s interpretation of Title IX. The changes to the enforcement of the women’s rights law would require public schools to allow males who identify themselves as females to use women’s locker rooms and compete in women’s sports. The rules are set to take effect in August. Lawmakers in the U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday voted to roll back the changes and federal courts in four states have blocked the new rules from taking effect in more than a dozen states.

What is the background on the West Virginia case? A 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel in April ruled that the state’s Save Women’s Sports Act violated the Title IX rights of a male middle school student who claims to be a female. West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice in 2021 signed the legislation into law. A district judge in Kentucky last month blocked Biden’s Title IX expansion from being enforced in West Virginia and five other states.

What happened in Idaho? Idaho Gov. Brad Little in 2020 signed the Fairness in Women’s Sports Act into law. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in August last year upheld an injunction preventing the law from taking effect. A federal judge in Louisiana last month allowed colleges in Idaho and three other states to ignore Biden’s expanded Title IX rules.

Dig deeper: Read Catherine Gripp’s report in The Stew about states standing up to the Biden administration’s revision of Title IX.