BRIDGEPORT, W.Va. – Attorneys representing a 15-year-old transgender student from Bridgeport High School have filed a brief in their United States Supreme Court challenge of the West Virginia’s Save Women’s Sport Act passed by state lawmakers in 2021.
Attorneys tell the court there are zero examples of transgender students taking athletic opportunities from biological females and that the Title IX, prohibiting discrimination based on sex and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
The brief says in part:
Becky Pepper Jackson wants to play sports for the same reasons most kids do: to have fun and make friends as part of a team. Her experiences on sports teams have given her the opportunity to build teamwork, confidence, and friendship while cultivating her work ethic. She feels free and fully herself when she is out on the field. Because participating on boys’ teams as a transgender girl would be isolating, stigmatizing, and publicly humiliating, and because co-ed teams in West Virginia are virtually non-existent, the girls’ teams are her only real option for participating in the school’s athletic program.
Attorneys conclude House Bill 3293 denies Pepper-Jackson the opportunity to participate in sports and all of the positives aspects that come with it.
The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear the case in January.
Story by Mike Nolting, WAJR