President Joe Biden’s Department of Justice has withdrawn its support for a lawsuit brought by three female high school athletes that would block transgender females — biological males — from competing on girls’ sports teams in Connecticut.
While initially backed by former Attorney General Bill Barr, who argued a pro-trans rule in the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference violated Title IX protections, the Biden administration has abandoned the case.
The suit was also filed against the boards of education in Bloomfield, Cromwell, Glastonbury, Canton, and Danbury.
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Alanna Smith, one of the three high schoolers who brought the case, appeared on Fox News Wednesday night alongside her attorney, Christiana Holcomb of the Alliance Defending Freedom.
“I am really disappointed in the news because me and the other girls — Selina and Chelsea — have worked really hard to get our stories out there, to get people to realize that fairness needs to be restored in our sport and all other women’s sports,” Smith told host Katie Pavlich. “These biological males are just taking it away from us.”
The lawsuit was filed in February 2020 by Smith, Selina Soule, and Chelsea Mitchell. Represented by Alliance Defending Freedom, the girls claim they have been denied opportunities to compete at higher levels because biological males have taken home the prizes for female athletes.
ADF’s suit cited two transgender high school athletes, then-seniors Terry Miller and Andraya Yearwood, both of whom competed directly against Soule, Smith, and Mitchell. Miller and Yearwood have taken 15 women’s state championship titles — titles held in 2016 by nine different biological girls in Connecticut.
Smith said she got involved in the suit after she “ran against the biological males at the New England meet because, in the 200-meter, I took third place when I should have gotten runner-up.”
“And it’s not really about placement,” she continued, “but it’s all about knowing that I work so many hours a week to be able to get runner-up in New England’s [championships] as a freshman.”
Pavlich argued that, while the left claims to be focused on “empowering” women, many of these transgender policies ultimately “disenfranchise” women by taking away scholarships, prizes, and opportunities from biological females.
When asked how she feels when people argue the pro-trans policies are “only fair,” Smith noted it’s important to realize what biological females are losing in the meantime.
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“People should realize that a lot of biological females have missed out on making it to meets that really matter, like stats and regionals, and the transgender athletes have taken spots on the podium that belong to biological females,” she said. “We train for so many days a week, so many hours, to be able to be the best in our state and the best in our region, and these biological males are just taking it away from us.”
“We really deserve it,” Smith added.
Holcomb told Pavlich that Title IX “was designed to ensure that girls like Alanna have a fair and level playing field, have a chance to showcase their talents, to be champions, and, frankly, to earn those college scholarships.”
In March 2020, Barr explained why the DOJ was backing the Connecticut lawsuit. He said that, under the CIAC’s interpretation of Title IX, “schools may not account for the real physiological differences between men and women.”
“Instead, schools must have certain biological males — namely, those who publicly identify as female — compete against biological females,” the former attorney general said at the time. “In so doing, CIAC deprives those women of the single-sex athletic competitions that are one of the marquee accomplishments of Title IX.”
Holcomb noted that, even after Biden’s DOJ stripped its support for the suit, ADF still plans to move forward.