A Washington mother and her teenage daughter have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stop schools from forcing girls to wrestle male athletes without notice, after an alleged assault during a girls’ tournament left the family without relief from lower courts.
Alliance Defending Freedom filed an emergency application with Justice Elena Kagan on behalf of Kallie Keeler, listed in court papers as K.M.K., and her mother, Stephanie Lynne Brown. The filing seeks an injunction pending appeal in K.M.K. v. Washington Interscholastic Activities Association, aiming to bar officials from pairing the girl against a male wrestler while the case moves forward, or at least to require advance notice and a no-penalty opt-out.
Fox News Digital reported the family says Keeler was 15 when she wrestled for third place at the Lady Jag Kickoff girls’ tournament at Emerald Ridge High School on Dec. 6, 2025. They allege a male competitor identifying as female penetrated her during the match. The family says no one told them the opponent was male beforehand; a coach from another team informed them afterward.
Keeler has been wrestling since age 4. She left the team in January and has not competed in a WIAA event since. With Washington’s wrestling season opening in mid-November, the application argues she will lose the season Title IX is supposed to protect unless the Court acts now.
"No girl should have to choose between playing the sports she loves and her safety."
That line appears in the ADF filing. The defendants named in the case are the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association, the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction, Superintendent Chris Reykdal, and the Puyallup School District. The athlete and the athlete’s family are not parties.
A federal judge in Tacoma denied a preliminary injunction on Aug. 23. The Ninth Circuit denied an emergency injunction on Sept. 25, characterizing the request as a mandatory injunction and finding no likelihood of success strong enough to justify relief before the season.
According to court papers described in later coverage, U.S. District Judge David Estudillo rejected claims of a known risk or an entitlement to private sex information about opponents. The district’s position, as reported, was that it would allow forfeiture if Keeler already knew an opponent was male, but it refused a broader guarantee and refused notice or a no-penalty opt-out. Officials said gender-identity information would be kept confidential.
The pattern fits a wider fight over sex-separated sports. Families and athletes have pressed similar claims in federal court even as judges dismiss related challenges on procedure or standing, including a Biden-appointed judge’s dismissal of Riley Gaines’ Title IX case against the NCAA.
Just the News reported the family’s motion describes the alleged conduct in blunt terms: midway through the match, the male reached between her legs and pushed his fingers through her clothes, penetrating her for several seconds, with video capturing her reaction. Keeler tried to lose twice. School officials took 55 days to report the matter despite a 48-hour mandatory reporting window.
"A 15-year-old girl was sexually assaulted because of political cowardice" by state officials who "insist on pushing gender ideology at all costs," said Alliance Defending Freedom senior counsel Hal Frampton.
Two Rogers High School administrators were later charged with failing to make a mandatory report. Prosecutors did not charge the opponent. The U.S. Department of Education opened a Title IX investigation into the Puyallup School District in February.
Keeler has spoken publicly about the match. In remarks carried by other outlets, she described confusion in the moment and a desire simply to end the bout. Her mother called the alleged conduct by a biological male identifying as female a “huge issue” that is “100% not OK.”
Breitbart reported Keeler was unaware of the opponent’s biological sex beforehand, told her coach she was uncomfortable, and that parents later emailed school officials. Pierce County authorities and the district opened investigations after media inquiries. Washington state law permits transgender athletes to compete in the category that matches their gender identity without the restrictions other states have adopted.
That policy choice is exactly what the family is challenging in practice. Brown asked the district for a guarantee her daughter would not face a male without penalty and for notice so she could opt out. The district refused both. The only option on offer was forfeiture if the male status was already known, a rule that does nothing for a girl who learns the truth on the mat.
Public debate over male athletes in girls’ sports has only sharpened as the Supreme Court has weighed state bans and as national polling shows deep division, a split tracked in coverage of how the transgender athlete debate divides Americans while the Court considers state limits.
The ADF application leans on the Supreme Court’s June 30 decision in West Virginia v. B.P.J., which held that states may limit girls’ teams to biological females, and on the March parental-rights order in Mirabelli v. Bonta. Those rulings give the family a clear legal hook: if states may reserve girls’ sports for females, schools cannot treat secrecy about male competitors as a privacy trump card that leaves girls exposed.
The Washington Examiner tied Keeler’s case to the same Title IX fight, noting ADF’s complaint against the WIAA over the incident and the lack of response, and pointing to the Court’s recent decisions upholding sex-based separations in sports. In a concurrence in related litigation, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that men and boys with gender dysphoria are not women or girls, even if they believe they are. Advocate Kim Scruggs put the Washington problem plainly: do not allow men in women’s sports in the state; what happened to Kallie shows she not only wrestled and lost to a male, she was sexually harassed during the match in front of everyone.
"Men and boys with gender dysphoria are not women or girls, even if they believe that they are," Thomas wrote in his concurring opinion.
Federal courts have repeatedly become the venue for these disputes. One recent example was a federal judge tossing a DOJ lawsuit over California’s trans athlete policy on a procedural technicality, another reminder that procedure often decides whether girls ever get a hearing on the merits.
OutKick sought comment from the WIAA, the Puyallup School District, and the Washington Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction on the Supreme Court application. The district had previously declined to comment, citing student privacy and litigation.
Keeler is now 16. She has said she is unsure she will return if she is paired against a male again without notice. The emergency application is built around that reality: without an order now, the season arrives, the pairings happen, and the girl either forfeits her sport or risks another match under the same rules that left her unprotected in December.
Congress has seen the same fight stall in plain sight. When female athletes have tried to testify about fairness and safety, Senate Democrats have abandoned hearings and left those witnesses without a single question, underscoring how little institutional urgency exists for the girls living with the policy.
The family’s request is narrow on its face. It does not ask the Court to rewrite every eligibility rule in one stroke. It asks for an injunction so one girl is not forced to wrestle a male while her appeal proceeds, or for notice and an opt-out that carries no penalty. Schools already know how to hold athletes out of matches. They use those systems constantly for grades, injuries, and eligibility. The refusal here is not administrative impossibility. It is a choice to keep male identity confidential even when the other competitor is a teenage girl on the mat.
Title IX was written to give girls a fair shot at school sports. A system that hides a male opponent until the whistle blows, then offers only a late forfeiture and a closed file, fails that basic promise. The Supreme Court now has the chance to say a girl does not have to surrender her safety to keep her place on the roster.
Parents should not need an emergency filing at the nation’s highest court to keep their daughters from being used as props in someone else’s experiment.
