On Sunday evening, Laverne Cox used her short time introducing Lady Gaga and Metallica to urge viewers to Google Gavin Grimm, a teenager whose case would be going to the Supreme Court this spring.
In 2014, Grimm, who had recently come out as transgender, used the boys’ bathroom at his school—Gloucester High School in Gloucester, Virginia—after receiving permission from the school’s administrators. “I went in, went out, same deal as always,” he told the Washington Post. “It was like, ‘Okay, great—I can use the bathroom now.’”
According to the ACLU, the school allowed Grimm to use the boys’ bathroom for two months, until parents and county residents began complaining to the school board. At this point, the school board adopted a policy that prohibited trans students from using communal bathrooms, and forcing them to use “alternative private” ones.
A year later, Grimm sued the Gloucester County School Board in federal court, arguing that their policy that barred him from using the bathroom that corresponded with his gender identity violated Title IX, the federal law barring sex discrimination in schools. He won at the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, overturning a lower court’s decision. But the school district appealed, and the case has been sent to the Supreme Court.
Grimm told the Washington Post that when Cox mentioned his name during the Grammys, he started shrieking.
“I was just so thrilled because I love her. She’s just a beautiful person inside and out,” he said. “I was really touched and thrilled and honored that that was the first thing out of her mouth.
Still, on Friday the Trump administration indicated it would be reneging some of Obama’s protections for trans students, filing a legal brief officially withdrawing its objections to an injunction that had prohibited trans students from being barred from using the bathroom corresponding with their gender identity in 12 states.
“Transgender students are entitled to the full protection of the United States Constitution and our federal nondiscrimination laws,” said Chad Griffin, president of the Human Rights Campaign in a statement. “It is heartbreaking and wrong that the agency tasked with enforcing civil rights laws would instead work to subvert them for political interests.”