The far-right Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) announced on Oct. 5 that it has filed an emergency application asking the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene in K.M.K. v. Washington Interscholastic Activities Association. The application asks the court for an injunction that would bar transgender girls from competing in girls’ sports in Washington state while the case proceeds. Alternatively, it asks the justices to take up the case themselves and decide it this term.
ADF and its client, Kallie Keeler, a wrestler at Rogers High School in Puyallup, Wash., allege that her transgender opponent, who attended a different school, sexually assaulted her during a match at a girls’ wrestling tournament. The Pierce County Prosecutor’s Office declined to file criminal charges.
ADF further argues that allowing transgender athletes such as Keeler’s opponent to compete against cisgender girls violates Title IX’s prohibition on sex discrimination, and that officials’ failure to notify Keeler’s family that her opponent was transgender violated the family’s “parental rights.”
The lawsuit fits a longer pattern of ADF litigation against LGBTQ and progressive causes. The group has challenged a Colorado school district’s policy of assigning rooms on overnight school trips by gender identity, sued to block Colorado’s anti-discrimination protections for LGBTQ people, and attacked the Biden administration’s efforts to expand access to abortion medication.
ADF has long faced criticism for its positions. The Human Rights Campaign has said ADF “poses an existential threat” to the LGBTQ community, and the Southern Poverty Law Center lists ADF as a hate group.
ADF’s argument builds on the Supreme Court’s June 30 ruling in West Virginia v. B.P.J., which held that Title IX permits schools to separate athletes by “biological sex.”
At the same time, the Keeler case marks an escalation in a nationwide lawfare campaign against trans athletes. Rather than defending an existing state ban, it asks the Supreme Court to bar trans girls from girls’ competition in a state that has no such law.
Trans advocates have long disputed the arguments ADF relies on. Many point to scientific reviews, such as one commissioned by the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport—the independent nonprofit now known as Sport Integrity Canada—which found no direct or consistent research showing that trans women retain a biological advantage over cisgender women after transitioning.
LGBTQ advocates also argue that the campaign by ADF and other conservatives is less about protecting fairness than about erasing trans people from public life. They cite bans on trans women in competitions where physical strength plays little role, such as chess and darts.
Some human rights organizations, such as the Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention and Human Security, go further, arguing that efforts to restrict trans athletes are part of a broader campaign—including bathroom bans, denial of gender identity and youth autonomy, and restrictions on gender-affirming care—that amounts to “a sharp escalation in genocidal language and actions against trans people in the U.S.”
LGBTQ advocates are pessimistic that the court’s conservative majority will rule against ADF, given its direction in recent terms and the views of justices such as Samuel Alito, who has called the court’s 2015 Obergefell v. Hodges decision legalizing same-sex marriage “perhaps the decisive point in our nation’s turn against religious liberty.”
To push back against the broader attack on trans athletes, the American Civil Liberties Union launched its “More Than A Game” campaign in support of Becky Pepper-Jackson, the West Virginia student at the center of B.P.J., who challenged her state’s 2021 ban on transgender girls in school sports. That effort suffered a setback when the Supreme Court ruled in West Virginia’s favor.
After the ruling, the ACLU urged supporters to call on their members of Congress to back the No Place for LGBTQ+ Hate Act, a Senate bill that would repeal several of President Trump’s executive orders targeting LGBTQ people. The Nov. 3 midterm elections could shift the balance of power in the House and Senate and give the bill new momentum.
No paywalls at People’s World
We hope you appreciated this article. At People’s World, we believe news and information should be free and accessible to all, but we need your help. Our journalism is free of corporate influence and paywalls because we are totally reader-supported. Only you, our readers and supporters, make this possible. If you enjoy reading People’s World and the stories we bring you, please support our work by donating or becoming a monthly sustainer today. Thank you!
CONTRIBUTOR
