Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett Makes Troubling Concession to Transgender Activists During Oral Arguments

A single phrase uttered almost in passing during Supreme Court oral arguments may seem insignificant—but it amounted to a revealing concession to an ideology that depends entirely on denying biological reality.

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Little v. Hecox, a case that could shape national precedent on whether men who identify as women may compete in women’s sports. The lawsuit was brought by Lindsay Hecox, a male who identifies as female and argues that Idaho’s Fairness in Women’s Sports Act violates his constitutional rights by preventing him from competing against women.

The moment in question came not from one of the Court’s liberal justices, but from Justice Amy Coney Barrett—typically viewed as a reliable conservative vote. While questioning Alan Hurst, the attorney representing the state of Idaho, Barrett adopted the left’s preferred linguistic framing while probing how far sex-based separation in sports could go.

Barrett posed a hypothetical involving very young athletes, suggesting a scenario in which “there’s no difference between boys and girls in terms of athletic ability, testosterone levels, etcetera.”

“Could you have sex-separated teams then — or, sorry, sex-separated teams by biological sex and not allow trans girls on them?” she asked.

Hurst responded by noting that the hypothetical didn’t apply because no school-sponsored sports exist at that level.

“Well, I’m just trying to give you a hypothetical,” Barrett replied.

“I mean, yours is driven by testosterone levels and differences in athletic capability. So I’m asking you what if you tried to take that out of the equation and you’re just drawing the line based on biological sex and saying that trans girls can’t be on the girls team in an age group that’s prepubescent.”

In that exchange, Barrett accepted—at least rhetorically—the central fiction pushed by gender ideologues: that “trans girls” are meaningfully girls at all. That phrase is not a neutral descriptor. It smuggles in the very conclusion the law is meant to reject.

They are not girls. That is precisely the point of Idaho’s law, and of similar legislation passed across the country. These laws were not enacted out of animus, discomfort, or cultural panic. They exist because sex is real, immutable, and relevant—especially in athletics.

Biology creates differences that language cannot erase. On a sports field, those differences can translate into unfairness at best and serious injury at worst.

To be clear, Barrett may not ultimately rule in favor of the plaintiffs. She sided with the Court’s decisions last term upholding laws that resist gender redefinition, and early indications suggest the Court will again uphold Idaho’s statute. Other justices signaled skepticism toward the challengers’ position.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh, for example, underscored the zero-sum nature of competitive sports.

“Sports are kind of a zero-sum game for a lot of teams,” Kavanaugh said, noting that “someone who tries out and makes it, who is a transgender girl, will bump someone from the starting lineup, from playing time, from the team, from the all-league [honors], and those things matter to people, big time.”

Yet even Kavanaugh, while articulating the practical harms, adopted the same flawed terminology. These are not “transgender girls.” They are boys competing in girls’ sports.

Words matter—especially at the Supreme Court. When justices concede the language, they concede the logic. And when reality is treated as negotiable, the law itself becomes unmoored.

Until the Court’s conservative majority is willing to speak plainly—to call men men and women women—the country will continue relitigating the same issue under different names, fighting an ideology that insists biology is optional and truth is subjective.