West Virginia AG Rallies Behind Middle School Girls Who Walked Out Of Track Competition To Protest Trans Athlete
From Tampa Free Press
Article By Liam Edgar, Original Publish Date: May 1, 2024
Even solidly red West Virginia is not immune to trans-induced fever politics.
According to media reports on Tuesday, five middle-school girls from Harrison County, West Virginia, refused to compete in the shot-put competition at an April 18 track meet because one athlete was a transgender girl.
The trans student, Becky Pepper-Jackson, 13, is reportedly undergoing gender reassignment procedures, including puberty-blocking medication and estrogen hormone therapy.
Still, the other girls from Lincoln Middle School did not believe Becky’s participation was fair.
Although West Virginia has a state law that bans biological boys from girls’ sports, Becky was green-lighted to participate because a federal appeals court recently ruled that the law did not apply to eighth-graders.
The county school board responded by banning the protesters from their next track meet.
Four of the five families involved in the protest have sued.
Former college swimming champ and conservative activist Riley Gaines said in response on X, “Rather than banning the boy from girls sports, they ban the girls from girls sports. You can’t make this stuff up. Sue them into oblivion.”
State Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, a Republican who is now running for governor, is helping the families in their cause.
Media reports say he has sued the school board and filed an amicus brief on behalf of the protesters.
“Their actions at the earlier track meet were not disruptive or aggrandizing. They were the quiet demonstration of the student-athlete’s evident unhappiness with the competitive consequences of a federal appellate court’s decision,” Morrisey wrote in court records.
He reportedly wants to push the case to the Supreme Court.
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