Just days after a state Supreme Court Justice upheld Nassau County’s ban on transgender athletes competing on women’s sports teams on county property, an appellate court granted a motion on Wednesday, Oct. 8, seeking a preliminary injunction against its enforcement.
The decision bars the county from enforcing its local law while litigation continues.
“We find that the Supreme Court failed to set forth specific findings with respect to the tripartite test for preliminary injunctive relief and improvidently exercised its discretion in denying the motion for a preliminary injunction,” the appellate court said in its motion.
“The appellate court made it crystal clear that any attempt to ban trans women and girls from sports is prohibited by our state’s antidiscrimination laws,” Gabriella Larios, a staff attorney at the New York Civil Liberties Union, said. “As attacks against LGBTQ+ rights are on the rise nationwide, we won’t stand for this hatred in New York.”
The NEW Pride Agenda, the state’s leading LGBTQIA+ advocacy organization, said it welcomes the appellate court’s decision and that the county’s policy is not about fairness.
“New York must continue to be a beacon of safety, dignity, and hope for transgender and gender nonconforming people,” the organization said.
Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman said the county “will continue to protect the integrity and safety of women’s sports,” in a statement following the appellate court’s decision.
State Supreme Court Justice Bruce Cozzens dismissed two lawsuits aimed at the county’s law on Monday, Oct. 6, saying that the purpose of the law is to “ protect women and girls.” He ruled that the county’s law aligns with Title IX, permitting biological sex-based distinctions in athletics.
Cozzens cited a prior Tennessee court decision in his reasoning, where that court held “that Title IX’s athletics and restroom regulations allow schools to separate athletics and restrooms ‘in accordance with one’s biological sex, without accommodating gender identity.’”
“We are grateful that the court found our legislation to be valid and legal,” Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman said Monday in a statement. “We will continue to protect girls and women from unsafe and unfair competition.”
The legislation banning transgender women from playing in certain county facilities was passed along party lines in 2024. It came after Blakeman’s executive order banning transgender athletes from competing on women’s sports teams in county facilities was struck down by the State Supreme Court because he did not have the authority to issue it without legislative action.
Blakeman’s executive order applied to over 100 different athletic facilities throughout the county and prohibited the Roller Rebels, a North Massapequa-based, all-female, flat-track roller derby league, which has welcomed transgender women, from competing.
State Attorney General Letitia James and the New York Civil Liberties Union, representing the derby league, sued the county last year over the order.
According to the NYCLU, the ruling was consistent with the court’s earlier preliminary injunction decision in January that maintained the ban.
In September, an appeals court judge called the county law a “violation.”
The hearing took place in response to the Nassau County Supreme Court, a state court under the appellate court, refusing to pause enforcement of the county law while the NYCLU and James’ lawsuits challenged the legality of Blakeman’s executive order.
The NYCLU is also fighting a battle in Massapequa, as it filed an appeal with state Commissioner of Education Betty Rosa on Friday, Oct. 3, challenging the Massapequa School District’s enactment and enforcement of its resolution preventing transgender students from using restrooms and locker rooms aligned with their gender identity.
At the district’s Sept. 9 Board of Education meeting, a resolution was passed which “mandates that all students shall be required to use facilities, including restrooms and locker rooms that correspond with the students’ sex as defined under Title IX and federal law,” according to school district documents.
