One day after President Donald Trump signed an executive order to protect women’s sports, the NCAA announced Thursday that athletes assigned male at birth are ineligible to play on women’s teams.
Trump unveiled the “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports” order on Wednesday. It bans transgender athletes from participating in girls’ and women’s sports.
College swimmers and volleyball players have voiced opposition to biological males playing in their sports and being in their locker rooms in recent years.
In response to Trump’s order, the NCAA Board of Governors voted to update the participation policy for transgender athletes. The new policy states that only athletes assigned female at birth are permitted to compete on women’s athletic teams.
It also says, “A student-athlete assigned male at birth may not compete for an NCAA women’s team.”
The NCAA said the new policy applies to all student-athletes regardless of previous eligibility standards.
NCAA president Charlie Baker said Trump’s order “provides a clear, national standard.”
“The updated policy combined with these resources follows through on the NCAA’s constitutional commitment to deliver intercollegiate athletics competition and to protect, support and enhance the mental and physical health of student-athletes,” Baker said. “This national standard brings much needed clarity as we modernize college sports for today’s student-athletes.”
Also Thursday, the Department of Education announced it will investigate San Jose State, the University of Pennsylvania and the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association for suspected Title IX violations.
“President Trump’s Executive Order ‘Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports’ is a promise to women and girls: this administration will not tolerate the mistreatment of female athletes,” announced Craig Trainor, acting assistant secretary for Civil Rights.
“… The previous administration trampled the rights of American women and girls — and ignored the indignities to which they were subjected in bathrooms and locker rooms — to promote a radical transgender ideology. That regime ended on January 20, 2025.”
On Tuesday, the NCAA was sued Tuesday by three former Penn swimmers who allege the NCAA violated Title IX by allowing transgender swimmer Lia Thomas to compete for the school and at conference and national championships.
The three swimmers (Grace Estabrook, Ellen Holmquist and Margot Kaczorowski) also sued Penn, Harvard and the Ivy League. The trio also asked for Thomas’ records and accomplishments in 2022 to be vacated.
Former Kentucky swimmer and activist Riley Gaines is part of a lawsuit filed last March against the NCAA for Title IX violations regarding Thomas, who was formerly a swimmer on Penn’s men’s team before the change in gender. Gaines was at the White House for Wednesday’s announcement.
Last fall, San Jose State had a transgender athlete (Blaire Fleming) on its women’s volleyball team and received eight forfeit victories when schools refused to compete against the Spartans. Boise State forfeited three times, including in the semifinals of the Mountain West postseason conference tournament.
San Jose State co-captain Brooke Slusser went public last fall and said the school didn’t inform the players that they had a transgender teammate. Slusser said she roomed with the athlete on a trip and didn’t know she was in the same hotel room as a biological male.
In the other case, a girls high school basketball team in Massachusetts had to forfeit a game after a male playing for the opposing team allegedly injured three females.
–Field Level Media
