In a year already marked by fierce national debate over transgender rights in schools and sports, recent legal decisions and political maneuvers have brought the issue to the forefront across the United States. From the halls of the Supreme Court in Washington to the campaign trails of Oklahoma and the basketball courts of Vermont, the battle lines are being drawn—often with deeply personal stakes for students, parents, and educators alike.
On September 10, 2025, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a closely watched order that allowed a transgender boy in a South Carolina public high school to use the boys’ bathroom while challenging a state law that requires students to use facilities matching their sex assigned at birth. According to the Washington Blade, the unsigned order was careful to clarify its limited scope, stating that it was “not a ruling on the merits of the legal issues presented in the litigation,” but instead “based on the standards applicable for obtaining emergency relief.” In other words, the decision applied only to the student at the center of the case and offered no broader precedent—at least for now.
Even so, the move was not without controversy. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel A. Alito Jr., and Neil M. Gorsuch dissented, though they did not provide any public explanation for their opposition. The lack of clarity from the nation’s highest court has left advocates and opponents alike reading between the lines, wondering what the future holds for transgender students and their rights in schools.
This latest order comes against a complex legal backdrop. In 2020, the Supreme Court ruled in Bostock v. Clayton County that federal law prohibits anti-trans discrimination in employment—a landmark victory for LGBTQ rights. However, as reported by the Washington Blade, that momentum appeared to stall in June 2025, when the Court upheld a Tennessee law banning gender-affirming medical care for transgender minors in U.S. v. Skrmetti. That ruling has fueled concerns that the Court could further erode protections for trans individuals, particularly as it prepares to hear two upcoming cases involving transgender athletes and their participation in school sports under Title IX.
While the Supreme Court’s South Carolina decision was narrowly tailored, it has reverberated far beyond the state’s borders. It arrives at a moment when states across the country are enacting or defending laws that restrict the rights of transgender youth, especially in the realm of athletics and school facilities. The legal landscape is shifting rapidly, with each new case setting the stage for further challenges—and, potentially, new precedents.
Nowhere is this more evident than in Vermont, where a federal appeals court on September 16, 2025, ordered the state’s school sports league to allow Mid Vermont Christian School to compete. The school had been expelled two years earlier for forfeiting a basketball game rather than play against a team that included a transgender girl. As reported by LGBTQ Nation, the Christian academy argued that participating in the game would have violated its religious beliefs that “sex is God-given and immutable and that God created each of us either male or female.”
The Vermont Principals’ Association (VPA), which oversees school sports in the state, maintained that requiring schools to play against teams with transgender athletes did not mean adopting those teams’ views. However, the appeals court sided with the school, finding that the league’s punishment was “unprecedented, overbroad and procedurally irregular.” The court also criticized the VPA’s executive director, Jay Nichols, for publicly castigating Mid Vermont and religious schools in general, writing that his comments suggested the league did not adjudicate the matter in a “neutral” fashion.
For now, the ruling means Mid Vermont can participate in sports and extracurricular activities while the underlying lawsuit continues. But it also highlights the broader constitutional questions at play: Can states and school leagues enforce nondiscrimination policies that include gender identity, or must they accommodate religious objections? The stakes are high, with the U.S. Supreme Court expected to review similar bans on transgender athletes in Idaho and West Virginia—two of the 27 states with laws restricting trans student participation in school sports.
The Vermont case has drawn national attention, in part because it sits at the intersection of religious liberty and civil rights. David Cortman, senior counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom—the conservative Christian legal group representing Mid Vermont—declared, “The government cannot punish religious schools — and the families they serve — by permanently kicking them out of state-sponsored sports simply because the state disagrees with their religious beliefs.” On the other side, VPA director Jay Nichols insisted, “There’s nobody at the VPA that has any animosity toward any religion. None of our officers, none of our members, or anyone employed by the VPA.”
Meanwhile, the political ramifications of the transgender rights debate are playing out in Oklahoma’s Republican gubernatorial primary. Charles McCall, the former speaker of the Oklahoma House, has made transgender issues a central theme of his campaign, launching a new website on September 9, 2025, called NeverTrumpDrummond.com to attack his main rival, Attorney General Gentner Drummond. In a new ad, McCall proclaimed, “I led the charge to keep boys out of our daughters’ locker rooms and to protect women in sports. You shouldn’t question where your next governor stands. I stand with President Trump.”
McCall’s campaign has highlighted his role in passing two major bills: a 2022 law requiring students to use bathrooms matching the sex on their birth certificates, and a 2023 ban on surgeries and hormones for transgender minors. Drummond, by contrast, delayed the state’s transgender health care ban for minors and filed a lawsuit against St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School, which would have been the nation’s first publicly funded religious school. According to Oklahoma Watch, Drummond’s campaign manager, Stephanie Alexander, fired back: “Gentner Drummond stands firmly with President Trump and faithfully serves the People of Oklahoma.”
Despite McCall’s aggressive messaging and the backing of the Oklahoma Conservative Coalition—which has poured $1.6 million into his campaign—he trailed Drummond significantly in a late August poll, with 10% support compared to Drummond’s 48%. Nevertheless, McCall’s ad campaign, running on cable and streaming until October 5, underscores how central the issue of transgender rights has become in Republican politics, especially in the aftermath of the 2024 election cycle, when former President Trump spent tens of millions of dollars on ads attacking Democrats’ support for gender-affirming care.
As the legal and political battles rage on, the future for transgender students in America remains uncertain. With the Supreme Court set to weigh in on key cases and state legislatures continuing to pass new laws, the coming months promise to be pivotal. For now, each decision—whether in a courtroom or on the campaign trail—adds another layer to an already complex and deeply divisive national conversation.
