USCA11 Case: 18-13592 Document: 304-1 Date Filed: 12/30/2022 Page: 114 of 150
that reflect medical science and oversimplifying—indeed, excising—the role of gender identity in determining a person’s biological sex. Second, and based on the first error, the majority opinion addresses itself to answering the wrong question. In the sections that follow, I answer the questions presented—whether Adams’s exclusion from the boys’ restrooms at Nease High School violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and Title IX. In my analysis, I rely on the district court’s findings of fact and the evidence in the record. I conclude that the School District’s discriminatory exclusion of Adams from the boys’ restrooms violated both the Equal Protection Clause and Title IX.
B. Adams’s Exclusion from the Boys’ Restrooms Under the Bathroom Policy Violated the Equal Protection Clause.
I begin with Adams’s equal protection claim. The Fourteenth Amendment provides: “No state shall … deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” U.S. Const. amend. XIV, § 1. The Equal Protection Clause is “essentially a direction that all persons similarly situated should be treated alike.” City of Cleburne v. Cleburne Living Ctr., 473 U.S. 432, 439 (1985).[1] State-sanctioned differential treatment is a “classification” in equal-protection terms.
- ↑ The School District argues that Adams is not similarly situated to “a biological male” because he is “a biological female.” See En Banc Reply Br. at 6–7. Without outright agreeing, the majority opinion expresses doubt that Adams is similarly situated to “biological boys” in the School District for purposes of
