Supreme Court delivers landmark victory for women’s sports and religious liberty In 6-3 ruling, Justices reject attempt to redefine “sex” under Title IX

WASHINGTON – In a landmark victory for female athletes and religious freedom, the Supreme Court ruled today that Title IX allows West Virginia to continue requiring public schools to separate sports teams by biological sex. In West Virginia v. B.P.J., the Court rejected the ACLU and Lambda Legal’s argument that Title IX—the federal law ensuring equal opportunity for women in education—requires schools to allow biological male athletes who identify as transgender to participate on girls’ teams, even though Title IX says nothing about gender identity.

Becket filed a friend-of-the-court brief in support of West Virginia, warning that redefining sex in federal law would threaten the freedom of religious schools, healthcare providers, and other religious institutions to operate according to their beliefs about sexuality. In today’s ruling, the Supreme Court rejected that redefinition, with Justice Kavanaugh writing that the term “sex” in Title IX “cannot plausibly be interpreted to refer to anything other than biological sex.”

“This is a tremendous victory for common sense, fairness in women’s sports, and religious freedom,” said Laura Wolk Slavis, counsel at Becket. “Had the Court read gender identity into Title IX, faith-based organizations across the country would have been dragged into court for their beliefs. Thankfully, the Court slammed the door on that dangerous path and kept religious groups from being forced into culture-war litigation.”

West Virginia’s Save Women’s Sports Act requires public schools in West Virginia to separate sports teams by biological sex, preserving equal athletic opportunities for female athletes. Before the law took effect, the ACLU and Lambda Legal sued on behalf of a male student who identifies as transgender after he sought to compete on a girls’ team. They argued that the state law violates Title IX by targeting the student’s transgender status. A lower court upheld West Virginia’s law, but the Fourth Circuit reversed. West Virginia then defended the Save Women’s Sports Act at the Supreme Court as being fully consistent with Title IX.

“Title IX has nothing to do with gender identity,” said Wolk Slavis. “Legal activists cannot make Title IX say words Congress never wrote. The Supreme Court made sure of that today, preserving fairness for girls in sports and protecting religious groups from being forced to surrender their deeply held religious beliefs.”

Becket’s brief warned that ruling against West Virginia would open the floodgates to aggressive actions by government bureaucrats and lawsuits against not only religious educational institutions, but also religious healthcare providers, since the Affordable Care Act makes Title IX apply in the healthcare context. The same pattern followed Bostock v. Clayton County, where the Supreme Court expanded the meaning of “sex” under Title VII—a law prohibiting discrimination in the employment context—to include sexual orientation and gender identity, but did not provide robust protections for religious liberty.

Read more about important religious liberty cases at the Court this term here.  

For more information or to arrange an interview, contact Ryan Colby at [email protected] or 202-349-7219.