Allowing 13-year-old Becky Pepper-Jackson to compete in girls’ sports “harms no one,” according to the family’s lawyers, but some of the 100 girls beaten by the transgender teen might disagree.
The West Virginia seventh-grader had a breakout track-and-field season this spring, defeating more than 100 girls in the discus and shot put. She beat out competitors 280 times and took one of the three coveted spots available to Bridgeport Middle School in both events for the conference championships, according to a court filing.
West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey brought a motion Tuesday detailing Becky’s march up the track-and-field rankings, saying the statistics show that Becky “is throwing farther than ever before — and improving much faster — than biologically female classmates.”
The motion filed along with the Alliance Defending Freedom asked the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals to withdraw its temporary injunction on West Virginia’s Save Women’s Sports Act, arguing that Becky is now “repeatedly taking away athletic opportunities from girls.”
“The displaced girls will never be able to recover those opportunities,” said the motion. “This broad displacement contradicts what B.P.J. told the court a few months ago — that not one ‘single person’ would be harmed by enjoining this validly enacted state law. We now know that dozens of young student-athletes have already been harmed.”
The 4th Circuit stayed enforcement of the West Virginia law in February pending the outcome of the lawsuit filed by Heather Jackson, Becky’s mother, which let Becky participate on the girls’ team.
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The 2021 lawsuit filed by Lambda Legal and the American Civil Liberties Union said Becky, then 11, had a “love of running” and wanted to try out for the cross-country and track teams, but it turns out the student has a talent for throwing events.
Becky’s improvement was dramatic: The teen took fourth in the discus and sixth in the shot put at the girls’ conference championships after averaging ninth during the season in the discus and 10th in the shot put. Last year, Becky averaged 47th in the shot put and 32nd in the discus.
Becky’s shot-put best distance improved by 53% from last year, while the two girls who went to the conference championships with Becky improved their personal bests by 32% and 9%, evidence that Becky is “outpacing girls in performance growth at an unusual rate,” the lawsuit said.
“B.P.J. acknowledged that the injunction could be modified if B.P.J. started displacing more girls,” the motion said. “We’re there now.”
In April, the Supreme Court denied Mr. Morrisey’s request for an emergency injunction letting the state enforce H.B. 3293, which would have barred Becky from participating in girls’ track and field.
“Becky should be allowed to continue to participate with her teammates on her middle school track team, which she has been doing without incident for three going on four seasons, as our challenge to West Virginia’s onerous trans youth sports ban makes its way through the courts,” said Lambda Legal and the ACLU in a joint April 6 statement. “This was a baseless and cruel effort to keep Becky from where she belongs — playing alongside her peers as a teammate and as a friend.”
Heather Jackson said she and Becky were driving home from cross-country practice when they learned of the high court’s decision.
“I looked over at Becky, who, throughout years of these unwarranted attacks, hadn’t shown even the slightest chink in her armor,” said Heather Jackson in a May 15 op-ed for Harper’s Bazaar. “This time, it was different. She let out a huge sigh of relief, as if the weight of the world had been lifted off her tiny shoulders.”
Twenty-two states have passed bans on biological males competing in female scholastic sports, and at least three of the laws have been challenged in court. The West Virginia case is the furthest along, having received rulings from a federal judge and federal appeals court.
Christiana Kiefer, ADF senior counsel, said allowing male students who identify as female to compete in girls’ sports means “girls are harmed and denied athletic opportunities — even in middle school.”
“This male athlete’s athletic success demonstrates that the injunction against West Virginia’s women’s sports law is undeniably causing multiple girls to suffer, and we urge the 4th Circuit to take immediate action and restore a fair playing field for female athletes,” she said.
• Valerie Richardson can be reached at vrichardson@washingtontimes.com.