Last month the Fourth Circuit Court refused to revisit its ruling, so we knew this was coming. Chris Geidner reports at Buzzfeed:
A case challenging the Obama administration’s interpretation of existing civil rights laws as providing protections from discrimination for transgender people will be headed to the Supreme Court this summer.
Because the court is soon recessing for the summer, however, the earliest the court could hear the case — if it decides to take it up — would be sometime late this year or early 2017.
The Virginia school board that passed a policy restricting students to restrooms reflecting their “biological gender” announced in a filing on Tuesday that it will be asking the U.S. Supreme Court to review a case brought against the policy by a transgender student.
On Tuesday, lawyers for the school board wrote in a filing at the 4th Circuit, “The School Board intends to file a petition for writ of certiorari with the United States Supreme Court within ninety (90) days of this Court’s entry of judgment.”
As such, the lawyers are asking the appeals court to put its ruling on hold while the petition to the Supreme Court is pending. A stay would keep the case on hold — and the Gloucester County School Board’s policy in place — while the Supreme Court decides whether to hear the case.
It seems unlikely that SCOTUS will grant cert considering that they typically do so when lower appeals courts are in conflict. So far all we’ve got is the one pro-trans ruling from the Fourth. But you never know.