The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that Title IX, a civil rights law prohibiting sex discrimination in schools, does not preclude states from restricting women’s sports to females. The decision overturns a lower court judgement that would have invalidated a West Virginia law to that effect.
In a 6–3 judgment authored by Justice Brett Kavanaugh, the court wrote that “separate sports teams for biological males and biological females are reasonable: Given the inherent physical differences between the sexes, allowing only biological females to play on women’s and girls’ teams can reduce the risk of physical injury and ensure fair competition.”
The court also ruled that Title IX’s language “cannot plausibly be interpreted to refer to anything other than biological sex” and discarded a challenge on the basis of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment, noting that the discrimination applied in this case was reasonable and for the acceptable purposes of promoting safety and fairness in publicly funded sporting events.
Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson, Elena Kagan, and Sonia Sotomayor dissented.
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