Last week, Kate Sossin wasn't exactly sure what to expect out of the Supreme Court.

Kate reports for the 19th, covers gender.

They were tuning in because the court was considering gender too, specifically,

the cases of two trans girls who are trying to participate in sports.

At the Supreme Court, the justice has grappled this week with questions of discrimination

and how to ensure fair competition. You may have heard about these cases.

One plaintiff here is a high schooler.

The other wanted to join a college running club.

Both live in states that ban trans athletes from competition unless they join the team aligned with their birth gender.

The court's being asked to decide whether that's fair.

This case has really big implications.

There are 27 states that currently have these types of similar laws on the book.

So any way that the court goes here will have major implications nationwide.

What did you make of what you saw?

You know, for a lot of it, I'll be honest and tell you that I was confused,

but sorting through it, I did find myself surprised because it felt like the justices were deeply

engaging with issues about transgender athletes in a way that I did not expect.

Huh. Like they really wanted to talk about this issue. Yes. And while the lawyers kept misgendering transgender women as like, you know, men in

sports and boys wanting to play, the justices, even the conservative justices, did not.

And so I was like, this seems like it's going not the way that I expected.

As Kate listened, some justices did openly fret about whether trans athletes are taking spots away from their cisgender teammates.

But as they kept listening, Kate started to hear this differently.

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