Thread by @MikeSacksEsq

2nd Circuit, sitting en banc, finds that non-transgender female high school athletes have standing to sue Connecticut for Title IX sex discrimination over the state's inclusion of transgender female athletes in track and field competitions. ww3.ca2.uscourts.gov/decisions/isys…

CA2 says if the state made trans girls compete with boys, and "transgender girls alleged that such a policy discriminated against them on the basis of sex and deprived them of publicly recognized titles and placements, they too would have standing to bring a Title IX claim."

"On remand, the district court should assess in the first instance whether Plaintiffs’ complaint states a claim for a violation of Title IX."

IOW: now that you can sue, you have to prove you actually have a case.

Judge Nathan (Biden), writing for the majority, concludes by cutting through the clutter of the many concurring and dissenting opinions:

3 out of CA2's 5 Trump appointees write separately to emphasize the limited nature of the ruling:

And yet two of those three Trump judges then concurred separately to state their position on a matter not decided today:

(Almost exactly a year ago, the original panel of Obama, Obama, Biden judges held that the plaintiffs had no standing) storage.courtlistener.com/pdf/2022/12/16…

Judge Nathan, along with fellow Biden appointee Robinson (who was on the original panel), to highlight the humanity of the transgender intervenors and strongly hints at her merits view that Title IX doesn't ban schools from including trans girls from girls' sports teams.

Nathan also footnotes the state of play among the circuits on the broader question of "whether Title IX requires schools to allow transgender girls like Andraya and Terry to compete on girls’ sports teams."

Judge Perez (Biden) splits with the majority's saying the plaintiffs could be entitled to injunctive relief that would declare them winners of the races they lost to trans girls, and she calls out Nathan's "shoe on the other foot" hypothetical

Perez brings her voice and experience as a former civil rights lawyer to her judicial opinion, both in a lengthy footnote rebutting the Trump appointees on the state of Title IX/trans law, and in taking a stand against courts misgendering trans litigants

Another Biden judge pretty much just says "sure, fine, whatever" to bridge the divide between the majority and the dissent over how the district court should proceed on the dispute over whether the schools were on notice that their trans-inclusive policy violated Title IX

The dissent, written by the author of the panel majority and joined in full by another of its members (both Obama appointees), says the majority went too far in how it let the plaintiffs proceed

The all-Dem dissent fights with the Trump judges' concurrence over whether SCOTUS's Bostock ruling that gender identity discrimination is sex discrimination under Title VII also applies to Title IX, signaling another fault line that will ultimately find its way to SCOTUS.