Trans Man Defeats School District in Court Over Bathroom Policy

Gavin Grimm has finally won his court case against the Virginia school district that wouldn’t let him or other transgender students use the correct bathroom.

The Gloucester School Board decided that students were only allowed to use bathrooms that corresponded to their “biological sex” or single stall unisex bathrooms, and reportedly refused to acknowledge gender transitions for trans students.

Grimm filed the lawsuit alleging discrimination in 2015, when he was just a sophomore, and it’s slogged through the court system ever since.

“There is no question that the board’s policy discriminates against transgender students on the basis of their gender nonconformity,” U.S. District Judge Arenda Wright Allen said in her ruling last Friday.

“Under the policy, all students except for transgender students may use restrooms corresponding with their gender identity. Transgender students are singled out, subjected to discriminatory treatment, and excluded from spaces where similarly situated students are permitted to go.”

And Grimm’s win after four years of this battle? Reimbursement of legal fees and a single dollar. But Wright Allen also ordered his transcripts finally be altered to identify him as “male,” and everyone involved knows this should pave the way for future lawsuits brought against schools for discriminating against trans students.

“My case has given me something of a platform that I intend to use, as long as I have it available to me, for trans education and advocacy,” Grimm said.

The case was originally supposed to go before the Supreme Court in 2017 but was kicked back down to District Court after President Trump rolled back legal protections for trans students.