Trump EO Bars Transgender Athletes From Women’s, Girls Sports

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump signed an executive order Wednesday barring transgender athletes from participating in girls’ and women’s sports.

“It’s absolutely ridiculous that we even have to talk about this subject,” Trump said ahead of a signing ceremony in the East Room of the White House that included scores of conservative lawmakers and female athletes.

“With this executive order, the war on women’s sports is over,” Trump declared.

That war, Trump said, has ben waged by “the radical left,” which he said has for years been engaged “in an all out campaign to erase the very concept of biological sex.”

In its place, he said, the left wants to foment “a militant transgender ideology.”

“Under the Trump administration, we’ll defend the proud tradition of female athletes and not allow men to beat up, injure or cheat our women and girls. From now on, women sports will be only for women,” the president said.

Earlier, during a briefing with reporters, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the order, titled “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports,” “upholds the promise of Title IX.”

Shortly after his inauguration, Trump signed an executive order declaring that it would henceforth be the official policy of the federal government that there are only two sexes, male and female.

His latest order on this subject gives federal agencies wide latitude to ensure that entities subject to Title IX that they provide funding to — mainly schools and athletic associations — act in accordance with the White House’s view that a person’s gender is what they were assigned at birth.

If not, Leavitt said at the briefing, those agencies are now expected to take “immediate action, including enforcement action,” against them.

In practice that would mean that any school or athletic association found in violation of Title IX, for instance, for failing to provide women’s-only locker rooms or bathrooms, could be declared ineligible for federal funding.

The new policy would also have a significant impact on the upcoming 2028 Summer Olympic Games in Los Angeles.

Ahead of Wednesday’s bill signing, Trump announced he’d directed Secretary of State Marco Rubio to inform the International Olympic Committee that “America categorically rejects transgender lunacy.”

“We want them to change everything having to do with the Olympics and having to do with this absolutely ridiculous subject,” the president said.

He also revealed that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is ready to “deny any and all visa applications made by men attempting to fraudulently enter the United States while identifying themselves as women athletes to try and get into the Games.”

“This will effectively end the attack on women athletes at K-12 schools and all colleges and unversities,” Trump said after signing the order. “I don’t think we missed anything, but if we did, we’ll make it up very quickly with another order.”

Neither the International Olympic Committee nor the organizers of the 2028 Games has responded to Trump’s statements or the signed order.

But some immediately condemned the administration’s actions, including the National Women’s Law Center.

“Contrary to what the president wants you to believe, trans students do not pose threats to sports, schools, or this country, and they deserve the same opportunities as their peers to learn, play and grow up in safe environments,” said Fatima Goss Graves, the center’s president and CEO, in a written statement.

“The far-right’s disturbing obsession with controlling the bodies, hearts, and minds of our country’s youth harms all students,” Graves said.

“Rather than protecting women and girls, sports bans harm any of us who do not conform to someone else’s idea of what a woman or girl should look, dress, or act like,” she continued. “Schools and sports governing bodies should stand firmly against implementing this unlawful executive order and ensure every student has an opportunity to play.”

Also condemning the order was GLAAD, the nonprofit LGBTQ advocacy organization.

“This administration’s latest inaccurate and incoherent piece of paper smears an entire group of Americans but does not change the law or the facts,” the organization said in a written statement. 

“All women and girls, including transgender women and girls, should be welcome to play sports if they want, make decisions about their own bodies, be hired for jobs they are qualified for, and be free from lawless attacks by elected officials,” the statement continued. “Anti-LGBTQ politicians with a record of abusing and silencing women and stripping their health care have zero credibility in any conversation about protecting women and girls. Every American should demand that so-called leaders stop attacking vulnerable people and start doing their jobs solving actual problems.”

GLAAD also argues that for all the attention the right has brought to the issue, the reality is transgender people make up only a small fraction of all athletes. In doing so, it cites statistics promulgated by NCAA President Charlie Baker, who late last year said he knew of fewer than 10 transgender athletes among the nation’s population of 510,000 student athletes.

Dan can be reached at [email protected] and @DanMcCue