District Court Sides With Gavin Grimm

Gavin Grimm's litigation against the Gloucester School District challenging its refusal to let him use the boys' bathroom because he is transgender has had many ups and downs. In one sense, "ups and downs" describes the case's procedural posture, as it bounced between and among the lower, appellate, and U.S. Supreme Court. "Ups and downs" also describes the mood of Title IX and transgender rights advocates, as Grimm's case was first dismissed by the lower court, then reinstated by the appellate court, then added to the Supreme Court's docket, then canceled after the Trump Administration withdrew OCR's prior position on Title IX on which the appellate court had relied when it ruled in Grimm's favor. This led the case to be remanded to the appellate court, to see what it would do without the benefit of OCR's guidance that favored Title IX's application to transgender rights. But the appellate court, in turn, sent it back down to the lower court... Whew!

Yesterday the lower court in Virginia sided with Grimm (so, that's a DOWN in terms of procedural posture, but UP in terms of mood!). Specifically, the court denied the school's motion to dismiss, ruling that both Title IX and the U.S. Constitution's Equal Protection Clause protect Grimm's right to use the boys bathroom. Sex discrimination includes discrimination motivated by an individual's sex stereotypes, and, the court found, that is what Grimm alleges the school district's policy does: "isolate, distinguish, and subject to differential treatment any student who deviated from what the Board viewed a male or female student should be, and from the physiological characteristics believed that a male or female student should have."

So what happens now?  Are we going UP again to the Fourth Circuit? That depends on whether Gloucester School District appeals. If that happens, will we stay UP in terms of mood?  That's up to the judges in Richmond. Last time, they ruled in Grimm's favor but, as I mentioned, did so in specific reliance on OCR's then-existing interpretation of Title IX. Whether the court will reach the same interpretation of Title IX on its own is a different question, but it helps that the district court has already laid out the argument for reading Title IX to protect the right of transgender students to use the bathroom that corresponds to their gender identities -- as have a number of other district court and one appellate court in similar case.

One final observation: those following closely might recall that one of the reasons the appellate court sent the case back down to the lower court this most recent time was to address whether Grimm's graduation from high school rendered the case moot. According to the parties' briefs, Grimm agreed to voluntary dismissal of his claims for an injunction and other prospective relief, which were unquestionably moot after his graduation. But litigation proceeded on his remaining claims for "nominal damages and retrospective declaratory relief." Retrospective declaratory relief is not something I've seen in Title IX litigation before, but clearly it's something all student plaintiffs should be including in their complaints!