Federal judge blocks Arizona’s transgender sports ban

TUCSON, AZ (3TV/CBS 5) — A federal judge in Tucson gave the green light on Thursday to let transgender girls play on teams consistent with their gender identity.

U.S. district judge Jennifer Zipps blocked the Save Women’s Sports Act from being enforced. The transgender girls said because they haven’t undergone puberty for boys and don’t have a physical or physiological advantage, they should be allowed to play on girls’ teams. Zipps agreed. “(They) do not have a competitive advantage over other girls, and they do not pose a safety risk,” she wrote in the injunction.

Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne, one of the defendants in the case, disagreed with the ruling and said he would appeal. “The Plaintiffs, in this case, claimed that this only involves pre-pubescent boys, but we presented peer-reviewed studies that show pre-pubescent boys have an advantage over girls in sports,” he said in a written statement. “The only expert presented by the Plaintiffs was a medical doctor who makes his money doing sex transition treatments on children and who has exactly zero peer-reviewed studies to support his opinion.”

Lawyers for an 11-year-old transgender girl from the Kyrene School District in Tempe and a 15-year-old Tucson girl filed the lawsuit against Horne and the Arizona Interscholastic Association, among others, in April. Both are on puberty-blocking medications and want to play soccer and volleyball in their respective schools. The law banning transgender girls from playing in girls’ sports was signed last year.

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