Transgender student Artemis Langford joined national sorority Kappa Kappa Gamma’s University of Wyoming chapter in 2022, upsetting female members Allie Coghan and Hannah Holtmeier.
The women responded by filing a lawsuit against the organization, but a judge dismissed their case the following year, noting that a private entity may interpret its membership requirements as it sees fit.
Highlights
- Two female students challenged transgender student Artemis Langford’s admission to their University of Wyoming sorority chapter in 2023.
- After a lower court dismissed their case, the women sought further review in federal court.
- A three-judge panel is now considering whether to reverse the earlier ruling.
While the ruling was expected to end the dispute between the two sides, the plaintiffs refused to be deterred and are now seeking further review in federal court.
“We were promised a sisterhood, and we were given a brother,” they complained.
Allie Coghan framed their lawsuit as a fight for the next generation of young women
Coghan, supported by the Independent Women’s Law Center, spoke with Fox News on Monday, September 14, as the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments in the case in Denver.
She alleged that Kappa Kappa Gamma improperly admitted Langford by bypassing the normal voting procedures at the Wyoming chapter.
Instead of using what she described as the chapter’s traditional recruitment app, Coghan said the members were required to submit non-anonymous Google Forms linked to their email addresses.
“They were knocking on girls’ doors asking for proof that you had voted,” she further shared, adding that officers told members they would be labeled “transphobic” if they voted against Langford’s membership.
The women reached out to the sorority in large numbers by phone and email and even had their parents voice their concerns.
Instead of a conversation and a solution, however, Coghan said they were met with silence, as the organization stopped responding to their attempts to communicate.
“If Kappa wanted to redefine the word woman to include men in the definition, that’s fine, but they have to go through the proper procedure to do so and allow members to vote, which they did not,” Coghan expressed.
While she has since graduated, she said a sense of duty to younger women keeps her involved in the case and seeking a resolution through the courts.
Langford’s admission allegedly turned the sorority house into a “political war zone”
Coghan described being back in court as a “surreal” experience, saying she did not plan on becoming part of such a lengthy legal battle.
“I remember when I was trying to decide if I wanted to sign my name on this, asking the lawyer, am I [going to] be married with kids before there’s any sort of resolution?” she said on Monday.
The response she got?
“He just kind of laughed at me and said, ‘I guess it depends on how soon you get married.’”
Further in her interview with Fox News, she recalled how Langford’s admission dramatically changed the dynamic within their sorority house.
She said that while Langford was not living in the house, the student was granted 24/7 access to the living quarters and common rooms, including an area young women needed to walk through to reach the bathrooms.
“You would see him sitting in the common rooms upstairs, and girls have to walk past those rooms to get to the shower. We don’t have a space to und**ss to get into the shower, so you would just walk in your towel and go take a shower and come back,” she recalled.
She added that the lack of action on their complaints about Langford’s presence eventually turned the space into a “political war zone.”
Coghan blamed feminism for making misgendered placements a norm
Expressing disappointment in the evolution of feminist movements, Coghan said she did not understand how it was “no longer pro women” and instead was “pro women erasure.”
“I hope that it will really set a standard of woman means woman. Woman does not mean man who thinks he is a woman. Woman is not up for interpretation. A woman is an adult human female,” she later added.
Angela Lavin, the attorney representing the suing sorority sisters, meanwhile, pointed to a change in the organization’s definition as contributing to what she described as problematic developments.
In 2015, however, the fraternity’s council issued a position statement describing membership as including “women and individuals who identify as women.”
Coghan and Holtmeier also discussed being asked to drop out of the sorority by their chapter president on a podcast
The sorority sisters appeared on the Riley Gaines Show last week and recalled the moment the chapter president told them that if they didn't like the change in their house, they were welcome to leave.
“She basically told us, ‘If you don’t like it, your values don’t align with Kappa’s, you can drop,’” Holtmeier said.
“Being told that, ‘If you don’t like it, you can drop,’ and not live in a house that I had called a home for already a year and a half was absolutely mind-boggling to me.”
She echoed Coghan’s comments about conditions in the sorority house, saying women would sometimes act as lookouts for one another while they were in the shower to ensure the hallway was clear.
A three-judge panel at the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is considering whether to overturn the lower court’s dismissal of the lawsuit.
Kappa Kappa Gamma, meanwhile, defended its right to interpret the organization’s bylaws in both court and its response to the press.
The organization also accused the plaintiffs of causing lasting damage to the sorority while expressing confidence that the appellate court would uphold the lower court’s ruling.
"She's a Karen," a netizen said about Allie Coghan
