Supreme Court declines to hear transgender rights case about bathrooms

The Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear a legal battle over the rights of transgender students, handing a victory to Gavin Grimm over the Virginia school board that denied him the right to use the boys’ restroom.

As is its custom, the court did not say why it was rejecting the appeal of the Gloucester County school district. Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito said they would have accepted the case.

The court’s decision not to take up the case does not establish a national precedent, nor does it necessarily signal agreement with the lower court that sided with Grimm.

But gay- and transgender-rights activists cheered the high court’s decision to stay out of the long-running dispute. It let stand a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit that was a resounding victory for Grimm, who has become a well-known figure in the transgender-rights movement.

“I am glad that my years-long fight to have my school see me for who I am is over,” Grimm said in a statement, adding, “Trans youth deserve to use the bathroom in peace without being humiliated and stigmatized by their own school boards and elected officials.”

The school district declined to comment.

In a 2-1 decision last August, a panel of the appeals court said the school board had discriminated on the basis of sex and violated the 14th Amendment by prohibiting Grimm from using the bathroom that aligned with his gender identity. His high school offered a single-stall restroom as an alternative.

Judge Henry Floyd wrote that the 4th Circuit, which covers Virginia, Maryland, West Virginia and the Carolinas, was joining “a growing consensus of courts” finding that the Constitution and federal law protects transgender students “from school bathroom policies that prohibit them from affirming their gender.”

Floyd framed the case in historical terms.

“The proudest moments of the federal judiciary have been when we affirm the burgeoning values of our bright youth, rather than preserve the prejudices of the past,” Floyd wrote.