Workplace discrimination Federal appeals court rules for transgender student in battle over bathroom access

A federal appeals court ruled Wednesday that the Constitution and federal law allows a transgender high school student who identifies as male to use the restroom of his choice. 

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit ruled 2-1 in favor of Gavin Grimm, now a college student, who originally lodged his complaint in 2015 as a Virginia 10th-grader. 

In doing so, the court cited the Supreme Court’s decision in June that gay, lesbian and transgender workers are protected under a landmark civil rights law barring sex discrimination in the workplace. 

That ruling did not resolve other issues regarding transgender rights as they apply to bathrooms, locker rooms, or interscholastic sports. The high court debated those issues during oral argument in the fall, and dissenting justices warned the 6-3 decision could have repercussions in those areas. 

The appeals court concluded, however, that by forcing Grimm to use a special unisex bathroom during his high school years, the Gloucester County School Board employed “a special kind of discrimination against a child that he will no doubt carry with him for life.”

“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,” Judge Henry Floyd wrote for the majority. “How shallow a promise of equal protection that would not protect Grimm from the fantastical fears and unfounded prejudices of his adult community.”

Floyd added that as a result of the Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision in June regarding employment discrimination, “we have little difficulty holding that a bathroom policy precluding Grimm from using the boys restrooms discriminated against him ‘on the basis of sex.’”

More: Supreme Court grants federal job protections to gay, lesbian, transgender workers

Judge Paul Niemeyer dissented, arguing that the school board complied both with federal law and the Constitution.

“The school board offered its students male and female restrooms, legitimately separating them on the basis of sex,” Niemeyer said. “It also provided safe and private unisex restrooms that Grimm, along with all other students, could use. These offerings fully complied with both Title IX and the Equal Protection Clause.”

Grimm first sued the school board in 2015, and after winning at the district and appeals court levels, he appeared headed for the Supreme Court. His case was bolstered when the Obama administration advised school districts nationwide to let students use facilities corresponding to their gender identity.

At the time, Grimm told USA TODAY that he wanted “to make sure that trans kids that come after me do not have to go through this experience.”

“No matter how difficult this has gotten for me, and it has gotten very difficult,” he said then, “there’s never been a single moment when I thought, ‘Gee I wish I didn’t do this.’”

But in 2017, the Trump administration rescinded the Obama era guidance, effectively ending his case. The Supreme Court wiped out the appeals court ruling, forcing Grimm and the American Civil Liberties Union to start over in district court.

Last year, the Supreme Court refused to second-guess a Pennsylvania school district’s policy allowing transgender students to use bathrooms matching their gender identity.

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