A U.S. appeals court on Tuesday ruled for a Virginia transgender student seeking access to the bathroom of his gender identity in a case that could impact the national bathroom wars playing out between gay rights activists and social conservatives.
The ruling by the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals sent back to a lower court the widely watched case that considered whether transgender students are protected by the 1972 Title IX Act, which prohibits sex-based discrimination by schools receiving federal funding.
Student Gavin Grimm was barred from using the boys' bathroom at his local high school in Gloucester County, Virginia. Grimm was born a female but identifies as a male.