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4w ago

Supreme Court Leaves 4th Circuit Order Intact, Allowing Transgender Student to Use Boys’ Restroom

The order applies emergency‑relief standards, leaving the underlying claims to proceed in the lower courts.

Transgender Day of Visibility in Columbia, S.C., as Supreme Court allows transgender ninth-grader to continue using boys' restrooms, rejecting the states's request to block him. (AP Photo/James Pollard)
Transgender activists, advocacy groups and allies gather at the Ohio Statehouse in Columbus on Feb. 25, 2025, to protest the state's transgender bathroom bill.
A transgender flag waves outside the US Supreme Court in Washington, DC, on December 4, 2024.
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Overview

  • A brief, unsigned order denied South Carolina’s emergency bid to block a Fourth Circuit injunction that permits a ninth‑grader known as John Doe to use boys’ restrooms during the appeal.
  • The Court said the decision is not a ruling on the merits, and the litigation over Title IX and equal protection continues in the district court and on appeal.
  • Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Neil Gorsuch said they would have granted the state’s request.
  • South Carolina’s restriction was enacted through budget provisos for fiscal years 2024–25 and 2025–26, tying school funding to compliance with rules limiting multiuser restrooms to students’ “biological sex.”
  • The Fourth Circuit relied on its 2020 Grimm precedent to grant relief for Doe, while the state urged the justices to view Grimm as undermined by the Supreme Court’s Skrmetti decision and the forthcoming review of transgender‑athlete policies.