U.S. Supreme Court justices have yet to decide whether they'll hear a case involving West Virginia's transgender sports law of 2021. WASHINGTON (WV News) — The bid by the West Virginia Attorney General's Office to have the U.S. Supreme Court decide the constitutionality of the state's 2021 transgender sports law remains pending. Morrisey Attorney General Patrick Morrisey's office filed July 11 asking the Supreme Court to take up the case. That came after the Fourth Circuit decided the state's transgender sports law — the Save Women's Sports Act — violated rights protected in the Constitution. Since West Virginia's initial petition, led by West Virginia Solicitor General Michael R. Williams, Deputy Attorney General Curtis R.A. Caperhart and West Virginia Assistant Solicitor General Spencer J. Davenport, several friend of the court briefings have been filed, while the respondent, the lawyers for a transgender West Virginia girl from Harrison County, responded Oct. 15 and the state replied two weeks later. The case was distributed for conference among the justices Nov. 15 and Nov. 22, but there's been no decision yet from the justices on whether they will hear the case. According to the brief from West Virginia, the two questions to consider are: Whether Title IX prevents a state from consistently designating girls' and boys' sports teams based on biological sex determined at birth; and "whether the Equal Protection Clause [of the U.S. Constitution] prevents a state from offering separate boys' and girls' sports teams based on biological sex determined at birth." The attorneys for the child, B.P.J, are Elizabeth Reinhardt of Cooley LLP in Washington, along with Cecillia D. Wang and David D. Cole of the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation in Washington, Aubrey Sparks and Nicholas Ward of the America Civil Liberties Union of West Virginia Foundation; and Tara L. Borelli of the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund Inc. of Decatur, Georgia. The child's attorneys frame the questions this way: "Does West Virginia's categorical ban violate Title IX as applied to B.P.J.?", and "does West Virginia's categorical ban violate the Equal Protection Clause as applied to B.P.J.?" However, the child's lawyers say the matter doesn't rise to the level of U.S. Supreme Court intervention. They contend that the office of Morrisey — who will become West Virginia's governor in January — is seeking "to create a false sense of national emergency when nothing of the sort is presented by this case." "This case involves one transgender girl — 14-year-old B.P.J. — and her as-applied challenge to H.B. 3293, a West Virginia law passed in 2021 that categorically bars transgender girls from playing on girls’ sports teams," the child's lawyers wrote. "B.P.J. socially transitioned in third grade; she has a West Virginia birth certificate officially recognizing her as female; and she has never gone through endogenous puberty — meaning that she has never experienced the effects of testosterone on her body that cisgender boys typically experience. "She was entering middle school when H.B. 3293 was passed, and she has been playing school sports since that time due to injunctions issued by the courts below. No other transgender girl is known to be affected by H.B. 3293 other than B.P.J. "Particularly given the lack of any circuit split on the questions presented, forthcoming federal regulations addressing transgender participation in athletics, and the interlocutory posture of this as-applied challenge — which the Fourth Circuit remanded to the district court for further development of the record — there is no reason for this Court to step in." The West Virginia Attorney General's Office lawyers see it much differently. "Schools have long separated sports into boys’ and girls’ teams. Drawing this line guaranteed that women and girls had a real chance to compete safely and fairly. Important laws like Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 then ensured that boys’ and girls’ sports teams received equal support. Women’s sports flourished," they wrote. But the Fourth Circuit majority's "holding upends the Title IX and equal protection frameworks," they wrote. "It tacitly overturns countless cases upholding sex distinctions for bathrooms, prisons, physical-fitness tests, and more. It rewrites Title IX, a law designed to protect female athletes, into one that subordinates their interests to those of certain males. It dispenses with any meaningful effort to determine how males are similarly situated to females when it comes to sports ... "The Fourth Circuit’s decision will produce a 'commingling of the biological sexes in the female athletics arena” that will 'significantly undermine the benefits' that separate sports teams 'afford[] to female student athletes.' ... This Court should set things right. The Fourth Circuit’s splintered decision casts into doubt similar laws in at least 24 other States, sows confusion about antidiscrimination law, ignores scientific evidence, and renders school sports an un-administrable morass. In the end, the decision all but declares that any law recognizing differences between sexes is unlawful whenever that law runs counter to someone’s 'gender identity.'" The U.S. Supreme Court on Dec. 4 heard arguments over a Tennessee case that involves bans on transgender medical procedures, and is poised to rule. It's possible the high court's ruling in that case could moot, or at least partially moot, some of the issues in West Virginia's B.P.J. case. "The Supreme Court heard oral arguments [Dec. 4] in United States v. Skrmetti, arguably the most important transgender rights case the Court has ever heard," wrote Ian Millhiser, a senior correspondent for Vox. "The case asks whether discrimination against transgender people can violate the Constitution — and it appears most of the justices feel it does not. The likely result is that the Court will allow states to ban health procedures that enable gender-affirming care, both for minors and, potentially, adults," Millhiser wrote.NFC's No. 1 seed comes down to Vikings-Lions showdown at Detroit in Week 18None
jili play
。
Obama's Ukraine Cover UpStrategists predict the TSX will hit 28,000 next year
Ashcroft putting political office on hold
ISPR presser
UT MARTIN (2-5) Niang 0-3 1-2 1, Salaridze 0-4 0-0 0, Guinyard 0-3 0-0 0, Trnka 0-1 0-0 0, Zuzic 2-7 0-0 6, Grullon 6-16 0-1 15, Cortijo 1-8 0-0 2, Radakovic 0-1 2-2 2, Faloppa 2-3 2-2 7, Hopkins 0-3 0-0 0, Bukumirovic 1-3 0-0 2, Williams 0-1 0-0 0. Totals 12-53 5-7 35.
Jimmy Carter, the 39th US president, has died at 100
Bucks All-Star named as 'long shot' trade target for Lakers | Sporting News