'Fastest girl in Connecticut' Chelsea Mitchell suing state after losing to trans athletes

[Leroy N. Soetoro]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/nba/fastest-girl-in-connecticut-chelsea-
mitchell-suing-state-after-losing-to-trans-athletes/ar-
AA1bXEiU?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=16d0f36f4df1471b864930e146eac4fa&ei=64
79

“At the end of the day, this is just about fairness,” Chelsea Mitchell
told The Post. “This is about biology.”

The 20-year-old is fighting for the integrity of women’s sports after she
lost more than 20 races over the course of her high school career — thanks
to a Connecticut policy that allows transgender athletes to compete in
girls sports.

Now, Mitchell, who has declared herself “the fastest girl in Connecticut,”
is challenging her state’s policy in court.

Mitchell is teaming up with fellow Connecticut residents Selina Soule, 20,
Ashley Nicoletti, 19, and Alanna Smith, 19, who ran high school track in
the state at the same time she did.

The four are suing the Connecticut Association of Schools and the
Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference, seeking to overturn a
policy which allows transgender athletes to compete in accordance with
their gender identity rather than their biological sex.

“I wanted to give voice to my story and help other girls out there so that
they wouldn’t have to experience this,” she said.

Chelsea realized her potential as a runner when she broke two school
records in her first meet as a freshman at Canton High School in 2016.

“Since then I just kept going with it and got better and better,” she
recalled. “Track is really just about hitting those long-term goals that
you’ve set for yourself.”

‘Fastest girl in Connecticut’ Chelsea Mitchell suing state after losing to
trans athletes
‘Fastest girl in Connecticut’ Chelsea Mitchell suing state after losing to
trans athletes
© Provided by New York Post
Chelsea Mitchell was an instantaneous track star, breaking two school
records in her first ever meet.Courtesy of Alliance Defending Freedom
For her, those goals were winning a state championship and going to
college for track. But in her first state-wide competition, she was forced
to compete against a transgender athlete—something she said she “had never
really heard of” happening until it happened to her.

In that race, the trans competitor bumped her out of qualifying for the
next round of competition.

“It was just obvious to everyone there that they had a huge advantage.
Everyone could see it,” Mitchell said.

By her sophomore year, she says there were two transgender athletes
regularly blowing biologically female track stars out of the water.
Mitchell raced against them for all four years of high school and in every
major race she competed in.

‘Fastest girl in Connecticut’ Chelsea Mitchell suing state after losing to
trans athletes
‘Fastest girl in Connecticut’ Chelsea Mitchell suing state after losing to
trans athletes
© Provided by New York Post
Chelsea (left) competed against two transgender athletes in her high
school career, including Terry Miller (center).AP
Related video

Did a transgender woman win first place in the female category of the
London Marathon?
Dailymotion
Dailymotion
“Just two athletes took so many opportunities away from biological
females,” Mitchell told The Post. “Even though there were only two of
them, they took 15 state championships away from other girls — and there
were 85 girls that were directly impacted from them being in the races.”

She herself lost two all-New England awards and four girls’ state
championships as a consequence.

“Having to lose four of them, time after time, and trying to pick yourself
up and go back to the starting line again and again was really hard,
because you knew each time that there was no hope to win,” she said.

In her junior year, she filed a Title IX complaint against the state’s
policies but remained anonymous for fear that exposure might hurt her
college recruitment prospects.

‘Fastest girl in Connecticut’ Chelsea Mitchell suing state after losing to
trans athletes
‘Fastest girl in Connecticut’ Chelsea Mitchell suing state after losing to
trans athletes
© Provided by New York Post
Chelsea came out publicly against the policy in her senior year when she
filed a lawsuit against the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic
Conference.Courtesy of Alliance Defending Freedom
But by senior year, she had “reached a breaking point” and came out of the
shadows to file her lawsuit with Selina Soule and Alanna Smith.

“It was like, if I don’t speak up for myself, who else is going to speak
up for me? As much as I wanted the coaches and administrators to speak up,
at the end of the day, they weren’t.”

Today, Mitchell is running track as a college senior (she declined to
disclose where she goes to school for privacy reasons), but she said
she’ll never know how the dings to her record impacted her recruitment and
scholarship prospects.

“When colleges looked at me, they didn’t see a winner. They saw a second
or third place,” she said. “I wasn’t a first-place finisher, and I think
that’s what really hurt me.”

‘Fastest girl in Connecticut’ Chelsea Mitchell suing state after losing to
trans athletes
‘Fastest girl in Connecticut’ Chelsea Mitchell suing state after losing to
trans athletes
© Provided by New York Post
Chelsea joins two other Connecticut track stars, Selina Soule and Alanna
Smith,Courtesy of Alliance Defending Freedom
On June 6, her argument will be reheard before the full Second Circuit
Court of Appeals in New York City after a three-judge panel of the Second
Circuit ruled against it last December.

“We’re hopeful that the court will declare that this Connecticut policy
violates Title IX,” said Mitchell’s lawyer Matt Sharp of Alliance
Defending Freedom. “We’re asking for the court to recognize the damage
done to Chelsea and the other athletes, and to restore their record and
the credit that they rightfully worked hard to earn.”

‘Fastest girl in Connecticut’ Chelsea Mitchell suing state after losing to
trans athletes
‘Fastest girl in Connecticut’ Chelsea Mitchell suing state after losing to
trans athletes
© Provided by New York Post
The three protested outside the State Capitol in Hartford.Courtesy of
Alliance Defending Freedom
In their filing with the Second Circuit, the athletes request that the
court order their athletic records be updated to reflect the titles and
rankings they would have earned had trans athletes not been competing
against them. The filing argues that “courts routinely recognize student
athletes’ ongoing interest in vindicating the records they’ve earned.”

Mitchell said her legal battle is more important now than ever as stories
like hers pop up around the country.

‘Fastest girl in Connecticut’ Chelsea Mitchell suing state after losing to
trans athletes
‘Fastest girl in Connecticut’ Chelsea Mitchell suing state after losing to
trans athletes
© Provided by New York Post
Lorelei Barrett is among the two trans athletes who bowed out of a state
competition in California last week.Twitter/@Riley_Gaines_
Just last week, two transgender athletes were no-shows to a California
high school women’s preliminary track and field state championship, citing
concern over public backlash to their recent races.

As a result, the two biological female runners who otherwise would have
qualified were not able to compete.

“I filed this lawsuit back in 2020, and so I think it’s sad that this is
still happening,” Mitchell said.

But, as her legal battle stretches into its third year, she is holding out
hope and watching a coalition build around her.

“We were the first girls to speak out about this issue, but now there are
so many more girls speaking out about their own experiences and standing
up with us,” she said. “The more of us there are, the easier it gets.”


--
We live in a time where intelligent people are being silenced so that
stupid people won't be offended.

Durham Report: The FBI has an integrity problem. It has none.

No collusion - Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, March 2019.
Officially made Nancy Pelosi a two-time impeachment loser.

Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
fiasco, President Trump.

Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
queer liberal democrat donors.

President Trump boosted the economy, reduced illegal invasions, appointed
dozens of judges and three SCOTUS justices.