Gavin Grimm attends the 2017 Time 100 Gala at Jazz at Lincoln Center on April 25, 2017. (Photo by Jemal Countess/Getty Images)

Gavin Grimm attends the 2017 Time 100 Gala at Jazz at Lincoln Center on April 25, 2017. (Photo by Jemal Countess/Getty Images)

The case of a transgender Virginia teen seeking to use the bathroom that matches his gender identity, once slated to be heard by the Supreme Court, has been sent back to a lower court to determine if the case could continue in the wake of his graduation from the high school in question.

After becoming a national icon in the transgender community amid a three-year campaign to use the male bathrooms at Gloucester High School, Gavin Grimm earned his diploma in June. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit ruled today that a district court must now determine if he still has enough of an affiliation to the school to continue the case.

As has happened in similar cases elsewhere in Virginia and around the country, Grimm’s request to use the male bathrooms polarized his community and spurred a bitter debate. The school board eventually voted to require that students use bathrooms that correspond to their “biological gender.” Grimm sued, and the quiet teenager was thrust into the center of a national debate.

The case made its way through the court system, and oral arguments to the Supreme Court were scheduled for the end of March. But in the wake of new guidance from the Trump administration, the appeals court’s ruling in favor of the student was vacated and sent back for reconsideration.

Grimm told Rolling Stone that he was disappointed the case wouldn’t be immediately heard by the Supreme Court, but he was optimistic about the conversation that his case engendered.

“On the one hand I shouldn’t have to be talking about this. No one should have to be talking about this,” he told the magazine. “It wasn’t very long ago that this case wouldn’t have made it anywhere. But there’s enough acceptance in the world now to where we can have a conversation about it and so I think that’s a very positive thing no matter the outcome. So I think that’s something that I need not discount.”

The case took another major step back today with the appeals court’s decision.

Filed Under: bathrooms, gavin grimm, meanwhile in virginia, transgender,