Becky Pepper-Jackson at the Lambda Legal Liberty Awards on June 8, 2023 in New York City. Her mother sued on her behalf over a West Virginia law that prohibits transgender athletes from competing on girls’ and girls’ sports teams in public schools and colleges. (Photo by Roy Rochlin/Getty Images for Lambda Legal)
WASHINGTON – Two high-profile cases scheduled to be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court could have far-reaching consequences for transgender rights, even though the Trump administration has rolled out a sweeping anti-transgender agenda over the past year, covering everything from sports to military service.
On January 13, the court will consider complaints regarding the law regarding Idaho AND West Virginia banning transgender athletes from participating in women’s sports. Both cases focus on whether the laws violate the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause.
West Virginia’s Supreme Court case also raises questions about whether the state law violates Title IX, the landmark federal civil rights law that prohibits schools that receive federal funds from practicing sex discrimination.
Lower court rulings have temporarily blocked states from implementing the bans to varying degrees, and Republican attorneys general in Idaho and West Virginia have asked the Supreme Court to intervene.
“We know we have an uphill battle ahead of us, and we hope we will prevail,” Joshua Block, senior adviser to the American Civil Liberties Union’s LGBT & HIV Project, who will present oral arguments in the West Virginia case, said at the ACLU’s Jan. 8 news conference.
“But we also hope that no matter what happens, this case will not be successfully used as a tool to undermine transgender rights in areas well beyond athletics.”
The outcome of the oral arguments before a court dominated 6-3 by conservative justices will be closely watched. According to data, nearly 30 states have laws prohibiting transgender students from participating in sports activities consistent with their gender identity Traffic Development Projectan independent team of advisors.
Idaho case
The judges will hear both cases in one day. It will come first Little v. Hecox, that challenges a 2020 Idaho bill that categorically prohibits transgender athletes from competing on women’s and girls’ sports teams.
Lindsay Hecox sued the ban in 2020, just months before the law went into effect.
Although Hecox wanted to try out for the women’s track and cross country teams at Boise State University, Idaho law – first of its kind in the country – would prevent her from doing so because she is transgender.
A federal court in Idaho stopped the law from going into effect later that year. A federal appeals court initially upheld the ruling in 2023, but later adjusted its scope in 2024 to apply only to Hecox and not other athletes.
Idaho appealed to the Supreme Court in July 2024.
Hecox has since asked both Idaho federal court and the Supreme Court to drop the case.
Some Idaho federal judge it rejected that attempt in October, but the Supreme Court put the request on hold until a hearing, meaning the justices could still dismiss the case.
“The Supreme Court is trying to decide whether Idaho can protect women’s sports based on biological sex or whether woman should be redefined based on gender identity,” Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador said at a Jan. 8 news conference before oral arguments.
“I think Idaho is just trying to protect the fairness, safety and equal protection of girls and women in sports,” Labrador said at a briefing with West Virginia Attorney General John McCuskey led by the conservative legal group Alliance Defending Freedom.
The West Virginia case
After the Idaho case, judges will hear arguments West Virginia v. BPJwhich focuses on the Mountain State’s 2021 bill, which also bans transgender athletes from participating in women’s and girls’ sports teams.
McCuskey argued that his state’s law “upholds and enhances the original intent and continuing intent and purpose of Title IX.”
McCuskey stated that the law complies with the Equal Protection Clause because it “treats all biological men and all biological women equally” and “does not prohibit anyone from participating in sports.”
Becky Pepper-Jackson, who was 11 and entering middle school at the time, wanted to try out for the girls’ cross-country team, but West Virginia law prevented her from doing so because she is transgender.
In 2021, her mother sued on her behalf.
A federal appeals court in 2024 barred West Virginia from enforcing the ban, prompting the state to ask the nation’s highest court to intervene.
The White House and Congress are focusing on transgender athletes
Meanwhile, President Donald Trump’s administration has taken steps at the federal level to ban trans athletes from participating in women’s sports teams consistent with their gender identity.
Trump signed the executive order in February 2025, which prohibited such participation and made it policy United States to “withdraw all funding from educational programs that deprive women and girls of fair athletic opportunities, which endangers, humiliates, silences, and deprives women and girls of their privacy.”
The The NCAA immediately changed its policy comply with an order limiting “competition in women’s sports to student-athletes who were assigned exclusively female at birth.”
In tardy 2024, before the policy change, NCAA President Charlie Baker he told Congress of the more than half a million athletes at NCAA schools, he knew fewer than 10 transgender people.
The GOP-led House in January 2025, it passed a bill that would prohibit transgender students from participating in female school sports teams consistent with their gender identity.
But Democrats in the Senate in March blocked the attempt in imposing such a ban and codifying Trump’s executive order.
Forty-eight Republican members of Congress argued in September amicus brief supporting Idaho and West Virginia that “if upheld, the lower courts’ interpretation would undermine the promises Congress has made to generations of young women and men under Title IX.”
On the other hand, 130 Democrats in Congress in a November amicus brief, she defended two transgender athletes, noting that “categorical prohibitions that prevent transgender students from participating on sports teams consistent with their gender identity cause significant harm to all children – especially girls.”
The group argued that such bans “fail to meet the standards established by the Court for assessing sex discrimination – whether under Title IX or the Equal Protection Clause.”
Trump’s broader anti-transgender agenda extends beyond sports participation in the nearly year since taking office.
He signed executive orders that: do it “U.S. policy recognizing two sexes, male and female”; restrict access to gender affirming care for children; and try to block openly transgender service members from the US Army.
“Textbook discrimination”
The Human Rights CampaignLGBTQ+ advocacy group, noted that there has been “considerable misinformation and disinformation about what the inclusion of transgender youth in sports entails” and that transgender student participation in sports “is not an issue.”
In statement Cathryn Oakley, HRC’s senior director of legal policy, said that “every child, regardless of their background, race or gender, should have access to a high-quality education where they can feel safe to learn and develop – and for many children this means being on a school sports team.”
Oakley added that “denying transgender children the opportunity to participate in school sports with their peers simply because of who they are is textbook discrimination and unconstitutional.”
