A Roller Derby Team Becomes a Bastion of Resistance to a Transgender Ban

In New York’s Nassau County, the Roller Rebels have joined with civil rights lawyers to face down the Republican county executive, Bruce Blakeman.

At 6 feet 4 inches before even lacing up her skates, Jack Sawula towered over most of her teammates at a recent practice of the Long Island Roller Rebels, a women’s roller derby team in suburban Nassau County.

The roller derby team, which competes throughout the Northeast, has long been a haven for L.G.B.T.Q. athletes. As in past seasons, it has several transgender members, including Ms. Sawula, who blocks opponents while wearing a hot-pink helmet and matching mouth guard.

But in July, the county enacted a ban on transgender athletes participating in women’s sports at county-owned sites, a move that County Executive Bruce Blakeman says protects girls and women against bigger, stronger athletes. He calls the measure a matter of common sense and says it has broad support.

But the ban has shaken the Roller Rebels’s sense of security and, members argue, violates their civil rights. So this season there are new faces on the sidelines: a team of civil rights advocates from the New York Civil Liberties Union.

The Roller Rebels formed an alliance with the legal group, which since March has filed two lawsuits opposing the ban. The squad has emerged as an unanticipated foil to Mr. Blakeman, a Republican ally of former President Donald J. Trump.

Karlen Velkovska, 33, a blocker known as Biscuits, called the ban “professional legislational bullying.”