Washington Attorney General Nick Brown has appointed the national law firm Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner, known as BCLP, to defend Initiative 638 in court on behalf of the state, in a statement issued on November 12 and reported across Washington on November 13. The appointment is the newest development in the fight over the voter-approved measure on girls' school sports: parents, TransFamilies and the Washington Education Association filed a lawsuit in King County Superior Court on November 9 asking a judge to declare the initiative unconstitutional and block it before its December 3 effective date, and the Seattle School Board voted unanimously the same day to authorise potential legal action of its own — both developments this site reported earlier.

Source: Washington Attorney General's Office via EIN Presswire

"One of the most important duties of the Attorney General's Office is to ensure that laws passed by the Legislature or by the voters through initiative are vigorously defended," Brown said in the statement. "I am deeply committed to that principle and my professional and ethical responsibilities as Washington's chief legal officer. My personal views do not dictate what laws get defended or the strength of that defense."

Brown said his office has spent the last two years doing extensive work defending the rights of transgender Washingtonians, including cases against the federal government over access to health-care services and defence of state laws giving transgender people equal protection. "We will not and cannot abandon that work," he said, adding that many other laws protecting transgender people remain on the books even after voters changed the state's approach to school sports.

What voters approved on November 3

Initiative 638, titled the Defending Equity in Interscholastic Sports Act and backed by Brian Heywood's Let's Go Washington effort, passed in the November 3 election with about 56 percent of the statewide vote, according to reporting by the Seattle Times summarised in state roundups, and carried most of Washington's counties. The official ballot explanation, summarised by the Secretary of State and reported by JustAbouts, says the measure would generally prevent transgender girls from participating on girls' sports teams and would require students entering covered girls' competitions to provide verification of their biological sex signed by their personal health-care provider. It covers public K-12 schools and private schools participating in the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association (WIAA) or similar organisations.

The lawsuit BCLP must now answer

The plaintiffs' complaint, filed November 9 according to the ACLU of Washington's case page, asks King County Superior Court to declare Initiative 638 unconstitutional and to prevent its implementation and enforcement. The plaintiffs are represented by the ACLU of Washington, Legal Voice and Pacifica Law Group. Their arguments, as summarised in reporting on the complaint, raise claims involving student privacy, equal rights under the state's Equal Rights Amendment, public education and the way the measure changes existing law. Those are the plaintiffs' arguments for the court to decide; no court has ruled on the request to block the measure, and the November 12 announcement did not announce any ruling.

Seattle's government has lined up on the challengers' side. The Seattle School Board voted unanimously on November 9 to authorise potential legal action, citing concerns that the initiative could conflict with existing protections for students, and Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson publicly backed the board's move. The Attorney General's decision therefore sets up an unusual alignment: the state's own largest city school district preparing to challenge a state law, while the state's chief legal officer hands the law's defence to outside lawyers.

Why outside counsel, and who BCLP is

Lawyers appointed this way serve as Special Assistant Attorneys General. Brown described such appointments as a common step when his office cannot handle a case itself, whether because of a conflict of interest, a need for specialised expertise or simply workload. "BCLP is a well-respected national law firm with a substantial presence in Washington state," he said. "The firm's attorneys have handled many important cases on behalf of the state previously. I am confident that this approach will best ensure that I-638 is appropriately defended in a way that its supporters can have confidence in, while also allowing our office to continue our other important work defending transgender rights." His statement did not name the individual BCLP attorneys who will appear, and reporting noted it did not identify a particular conflict requiring the office to step aside.

BCLP was formed in 2018 by the merger of St. Louis-based Bryan Cave and London-based Berwin Leighton Paisner, according to the Northwest Progressive Institute's Cascadia Advocate, and later absorbed the Seattle firm Harrigan Leyh Farmer & Thomsen. Critics of the choice were also reported on November 13: 570 KVI reported that the firm has represented transgender-health advocates in other litigation, a point raised by supporters of the initiative who questioned the pick — a criticism of the appointment, reported as such, that BCLP and the Attorney General's Office will have to answer in how the defence is run.

For Washington families — including Punjabi and other immigrant families with daughters in public-school sports across Seattle, King County and the rest of the state — the case will decide what paperwork, if any, a girl must show to play on a girls' team this school year, and whether a measure approved by voters statewide can be stopped by a county court before it ever takes effect.