Labrador urges Supreme Court to take up Idaho transgender athletics ban

Attorney General Raúl Labrador wants the U.S. Supreme Court to quickly take up Idaho’s law banning transgender athletes from women’s sports.

The transgender athletics debate has only become more muddled since Idaho passed its first-in-the-nation ban in 2020. Twenty-six states have followed suit with similar transgender bans. Public schools and colleges and universities face an unworkable situation, navigating competing federal court decisions and orders from the White House and the NCAA, according to a brief filed with the Supreme Court.

And meanwhile, the brief said, “The women and girls who are missing out on medals, podium spots, and opportunities to compete in their own sports deserve answers sooner rather than later.”

The brief urges the Supreme Court to immediately take up the Idaho law, rather than kicking the long-standing legal dispute back to a lower federal court. It is co-signed by Labrador, solicitor general Alan Hurst and attorneys for Alliance Defending Freedom, a Washington, D.C., conservative nonprofit.

The brief comes days after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a Tennessee state law banning gender-affirming care for minors. But this ruling did not address “vital constitutional questions about sex-based classifications,” Labrador’s office said in a news release Wednesday.

Kevin Richert

Kevin Richert

Senior reporter and blogger Kevin Richert specializes in education politics and education policy. He has more than 35 years of experience in Idaho journalism. He is a frequent guest on "Idaho Reports" on Idaho Public Television and "Idaho Matters" on Boise State Public Radio. He can be reached at krichert@idahoednews.org

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