The Supreme Court has declined to hear a case challenging a lower court ruling against a school's policy banning transgender bathroom use on school grounds.
Six years after their policy was originally challenged in court, the Gloucester County, Virginia school board has been sent home with a final verdict.
From NBC News:
Lawyers from the American Civil Liberties Union, representing [transgender student Gavin Grimm], told the court that treating him differently by requiring him to use separate single-stall bathrooms singled him out "and stigmatized him as unfit to use the same restroom as his peers."
They said there was no need for the Supreme Court to take up the appeal, because the lower courts that have considered the issue reached the same conclusion — that treating transgender students differently violates a federal law, known as Title IX, that bans sex discrimination in school programs.
Monday's order denying review in the case means Grimm's victory in the appeals court remains intact.
The Fourth District Court of Appeals in D.C. ruled that transgender bathroom bills are unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Transgender people are entitled to equal protection under the law the same as anyone else according to the court. And that makes sense as long as words still have meaning.
The Supreme Court's decision not to take the case effectively means they agree with the lower court, but we already knew they would.
As limited as it may or may not have been, Justice Neil Gorsuch's majority opinion that "sex" covers gender identity under one section of the Civil Rights Act can be logically applied to every other section of the law and the Constitution itself.
As conservative as today's court is, I don't see more than two or three of them saying a whole class of Americans is not entitled to their constitutional rights. Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissented in this case, but those two would dissent against their own mothers.
As a transgender woman, there are many things I worry about from week to week, but my fate in front of the Supreme Court is no longer one of them. I was worried sick prior to the court's previous ruling that I'm covered by the Civil Rights Act, but that settled many questions even if a handful remain.