Riley Gaines-Simone Biles feud inspired Oregon girls to sue their state over trans athlete laws

Female athletes Sophia Carpenter and Maddie Eischen filed a lawsuit against Oregon for its trans athlete policies, and said they felt encouraged to do so after Simone Biles attacked Riley Gaines on social media.

EXCLUSIVE: A group of teen girls are suing the state of Oregon over its laws that allow trans athletes to compete in girls' sports. 

Two of the girls said they made the decision to file the lawsuit after witnessing the viral feud between Riley Gaines and Simone Biles in June. 

Maddie Eischen and Sophia Carpenter first entered the national battle when they refused to compete against a trans athlete at the Chehalem Classic back on April 18. They told Fox News Digital that Gaines reached out to them shortly after their forfeit and encouraged them to consider filing a lawsuit against the state.

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Oregon girls' track and field athlete Maddie Eischen. (Courtesy of Maddie Eischen)

Then, after seeing the fallout of Gaines' online clash with Biles, Eischen and Carpenter were convinced to file suit.

"I think especially when Riley Gaines and Simone Biles, and that whole thing happened and kind of seeing how that played out and how the public responded, I think that was encouraging to see how many people are on the side of protecting women's sports," Carpenter said. 

Eischen recalls the public reaction she saw to both Biles and Gaines when the war of words started between the two women. Eischen especially recalls seeing the comments on Biles' recent Instagram posts that night. 

"All of the comments on Simone's post were very negative to her, I saw people that commented on it, and I liked it. But there was a lot of shock that she had even said that, and disappointment,"