The U.S. House of Representatives has approved legislation that aims to bar transgender women and girls from participating in female athletic programs in schools.
The House passed the bill, titled the “Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act,” on Tuesday, though it was a divided vote, 218 to 206, almost entirely on party lines.
The bill would prohibit federal funding from going to K-12 schools that include transgender students on women’s sports teams. It seeks to amend federal law to require that “sex shall be recognized based solely on a person’s reproductive biology and genetics at birth,” to determine compliance with Title IX in athletics, according to the legislative text.
Although it was passed by the House, the bill still needs to be approved by the Senate, and ultimately signed by the President, to become law. At the Senate level, it’s far from certain the bill will be passed, as seven Democrats would have to join the Republicans in voting in favor of it.
Barring trans participation in female sports was part of the Republican platform in the recent U.S. election, arguing that transgender women hold physical advantages over cisgender women, while Democrats have generally been opposed to these types of bills and believe the policies discriminate against transgender students and could be harmful to their mental health.
The New York Times reports that just two Democrats joined all Republicans in voting in favor of the bill, while another Democrat simply voted “present,” declining to take a position.
“The overwhelming majority believe men don’t belong in women’s sports,” said Representative Greg Steube, the Florida Republican who sponsored the measure, according to The New York Times. “This bill will deliver upon the mandate the American people gave Congress.”
Democrats, however, have dubbed the bill the “Child Predator Empowerment Act,” and claim it’s an invasion of privacy for young girls that puts them at greater risk.
The New York Times report adds: “(Democrats) also pointed to the bill as the latest example of an unhealthy fixation among Republicans with trying to restrict the rights of transgender individuals, when they could be spending their time passing legislation to create jobs or reduce the prices of groceries.”
The bill would not “prohibit schools or institutions from permitting males to practice against women’s sports teams,” according to a fact sheet from the House committee on Education and the Workforce.
It doesn’t prohibit males from training or practicing with an athletic program or activity designated for women or girls, “so long as no female is deprived of a roster spot on a team or sport, opportunity to participate in a practice or competition, scholarship, admission to an educational institution, or any other benefit that accompanies participating in the athletic program or activity,” the legislative text reads, according to CNN.
However, the Education committee fact sheet states that under the bill, “a recipient of federal education funding violates Title IX’s prohibition against sex discrimination if the recipient operates, sponsors, or facilitates athletic programs or activities and allows a person whose sex is male to participate in an athletic program or activity that is designated for women or girls.”
The participation of transgender women in female sports came to the forefront during the 2021-22 NCAA season, when University of Pennsylvania swimmer Lia Thomas competed on the women’s team after transitioning from male to female in 2019.
Thomas won the 2022 Women’s NCAA title in the 500 freestyle, and also tied for 5th in the 200 free and 8th in the 100 free. She has not competed since, opposing World Aquatics’ restriction on transgender participation, but ultimately losing the legal battle in 2024.
World Aquatics has since experimented with an ‘open’ category, where transgender athletes are able to compete.
In April 2024, the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) announced a new policy that bans transgender participation in women’s sports.
In 2022, the NCAA updated its transgender policy with a sport-by-sport approach where each discipline’s guidelines would be determined by the existing policy for the national governing body (NGB) of that sport, hoping to align with the Olympic Movement.
