July 10, 2026
DEEP DIVE: Access for Transgender Athletes After West Virginia v. B.P.J.: What the Supreme Court Decided and What It Left Unresolved
In Access for Transgender Athletes After West Virginia v. B.P.J.: What the Supreme Court Decided and What It Left Unresolved, we unpack the Supreme Court’s recent decision in West Virginia v. B.P.J. and Little v. Hecox, two consolidated cases challenging state bans on transgender girls’ and women’s participation in athletics aligned with their gender identity rather than their sex assigned at birth. The Court held that Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 and the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution allow states to restrict students’ access to athletics based on “biological sex.” The Court’s ruling did not resolve whether Title IX and the Equal Protection Clause require states to do so as a matter of law, recognizing that this separate question is the subject of ongoing litigation in lower courts.
In this Deep Dive, Katy Joseph and Amanda Dallo provide an overview of the Title IX statutory framework permitting sex-separate teams, outline the facts and history of the B.P.J. and Hecox cases, and offer a deeper analysis of the Supreme Court’s recent decision (including a number of significant questions that the Court did not address). Finally, the Deep Dive concludes with a discussion of the implications for students, school districts, states, and institutions of higher education, as well as recommended best practices while navigating this new legal landscape.
Click here to access the Alert and click here to download a PDF version.
