Adams ex rel. Kasper v. School Board of St. Johns County, Florida
Florida court case on transgender students' rights to access bathrooms / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Adams ex rel. Kasper v. School Board of St. Johns County, Florida is a court case from the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit addressing whether schools can separate bathrooms on the basis of biological sex, and thus refuse to allow transgender students to use bathrooms that match their gender identity. The case was filed by Erica Adams Kasper on behalf of Drew Adams, a minor at the time, against the school board of St. Johns County, Florida, in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida. The lawsuit was filed after Adams was denied access to the boys' bathrooms at Nease High School.[1][2] Kasper claimed that Adams's rights were being violated on account of discriminated on the basis of sex, which is prohibited by Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, and a violation of the equal protection of the laws under the Fourteenth Amendment.[3]
Adams ex rel. Kasper v. School Board of St. Johns County, Florida | |
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Court | 11th Circuit Court of Appeals |
Decided | December 2022 |
Case history | |
Appealed from | U.S.D.C., M.D. Fla. |
Court membership | |
Judges sitting | William Pryor, Chief Judge, and Charles R. Wilson, Adalberto Jordan, Robin S. Rosenbaum, Jill A. Pryor, Kevin Newsom, Elizabeth L. Branch, Britt Grant, Robert J. Luck, Barbara Lagoa, and Andrew L. Brasher, Circuit Judges |
Case opinions | |
Majority | Lagoa, joined by William Pryor, Newsom, Branch, Grant, Luck, and Brasher |
Concurrence | Lagoa |
Dissent | Wilson |
Dissent | Jordan, joined by Wilson, Rosenbaum |
Dissent | Rosenbaum |
Dissent | Jill Pryor, joined by Rosenbaum (as to Parts I, II, III.A, III.B., III.D., and IV) |
Adams has been using the boys' bathrooms for the six weeks of freshman year when, following an anonymous complaint from two female students, Adams was informed that only the use of the gender-neutral bathrooms or the girls' bathrooms would be acceptable.[4][5] The plaintiff argued that Title IX protections encompass gender identity, and thus policies or rules governing schools may not turn on one's sex as assigned at birth.[6]
Kasper was represented by the LGBTQ rights law organization Lambda Legal, and was supported in amicus briefs by over fifty organizations, including the National Women's Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League. ADL's brief made the argument that the school board's "protective concerns" were invalid because they were based on discriminatory stereotypes and that there was no evidence that use of the restroom corresponding to gender identity in the county's schools caused any injury or harm to students.[6] A critic of the ruling argued that sex and gender identity should be differentiated and that Adams's right therefore would not fall under Title IX protections.[2] St. Johns County School Board was represented by Sniffen & Spellman, P.A., a Florida law firm that specializes in civil rights and education law issues.