EXCLUSIVE: Attorneys general from 27 states and the U.S. Territory of Guam have signed onto amicus briefs to support the defense in a forthcoming Supreme Court case to protect women’s sports from transgender athlete inclusion.
The Supreme Court agreed in July to review state bans on transgender athletes participating in public school sports. The two cases it will hear, Little vs. Hecox in Idaho and BPJ vs. West Virginia, focused on state laws that prevent biological males from competing on girls’ and women’s sports teams.
The plaintiffs in the cases, transgender athletes, sought to bypass those laws while the defendants, state authorities in West Virginia and Idaho, seek to uphold the laws.
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Now, the AGs from Arkansas, Alabama, Alaska, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, and Wyoming, and the U.S. Territory of Guam are all throwing their support behind the defendants, as seen in copies of the briefs obtained by Fox News Digital.
The AGs from Idaho and West Virginia only signed the briefs for the case that is not based in their state, as they are already a defendant in the case within their state.
“At the heart of these cases is a fundamental question: can states uphold laws that preserve fairness and opportunity for female athletes? The answer must be yes. Across the country, girls and women are once again being asked to overcome structural disadvantages that Title IX was designed to eliminate. This is not about exclusion—it’s about preserving the integrity of female athletics,” Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said in a statement provided to Fox News Digital.
“We must protect these opportunities because law, science, and the public will is on our side. We believe the court will be as well.”
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West Virginia, which enacted the “Save Women’s Sports Act” in 2021, is appealing a lower-court ruling that allowed transgender athlete Becky Pepper-Jackson to compete on the school’s cross-country and track teams. This past year, Pepper-Jackson qualified for the West Virginia girls high school state track meet, finishing third in the discus throw and eighth in the shot put in the Class AAA division.
The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of Pepper-Jackson, who has been taking puberty-blocking medication, in an April 2024 ruling based on the Constitution’s equal protection clause.
Idaho, which became the first state in the country to ban transgender athletes from girls’ and women’s sports in 2020, asked the Supreme Court to hear its case involving Lindsay Hecox, a trans athlete wanting to compete on Boise State’s women’s track team.
A 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel upheld an injunction blocking Idaho state law in 2023.
Hecox asked the Supreme Court earlier this month to drop her challenge against the Idaho state law.
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Meanwhile, Idaho Attorney General Raul Labrador hopes for the Supreme Court to cast a decision with a wider impact than just letting one state carry out its own specific law on the issue. He wants a new national precedent. “I believe that that’s what they’re gonna do,” Labrador told Fox News Digital in an exclusive interview.
“I think they’re going to have a big ruling on whether men can participate in women’s sports, and more importantly, how to determine whether transgender individuals are protected by the federal constitutions and state and federal laws.”