U.S. President Donald Trump took executive action Wednesday to deliver on a political issue central to his 2024 campaign: banning transgender women from competing in women’s sports. Trump signed an executive order titled “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports” at an afternoon signing ceremony in the East Room, surrounded by dozens of women and some young girls in athletic uniforms. “With this executive order, the war on women’s sports is over,” the president said. The order is two-pronged, leaning on compliance with Title IX, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in education programs or activities that receive funding from the federal government, as well as federal engagement with the private sector. Trump’s latest measure comes as his administration has already sought to target transgender rights through executive action, some of which is already facing legal challenges. Ahead of the signing, a White House official said that the new action will take the opposite position on Title IX from the Biden administration, which established a rule that schools are violating Title IX when they ban transgender students from participating on sports teams. The Trump administration’s position on Title IX, the official said, is “if you’re going to have women’s sports, if you’re going to provide opportunities for women, then they have to be equally safe, equally fair, and equally private opportunities, and so that means that you’re going to preserve women’s sports for women.” Some critics of transgender athletes claim they have an unfair advantage in sports, but that’s not what the research shows. While research is limited and ongoing, a 2017 review in the peer-reviewed journal Sports Medicine found “no direct or consistent research” showing trans people have an athletic advantage. A more recent October 2023 review of the research concluded that sex differences do develop following puberty, but many are “reduced, if not erased, over time by gender affirming hormone therapy.” Physical attributes that could work in a trans girls’ favor, like height or limb length, for example, appear to be “less malleable,” the study said, but it also pointed out that there are no efforts to restrict cisgender athletes who are taller than average or exceptionally gifted physically in any other way. The White House official indicated that the administration will consider additional guidance, regulations and interpretations of Title IX, and will also push for investigations of schools that are not seen to be in compliance by the Department of Education. Schools that are not in compliance, the official later warned, are “putting their federal funding in jeopardy vis a vis the U.S. government.” Trump has been advocating for dismantling the Department of Education. If that endeavor is successful, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that the administration “will look at additional maneuvers to ensure that these very important policies can be implemented.” The Trump administration also believes it has a “role to play” with sporting bodies, the official said, and plans to bring sporting organizations to the White House to “listen to the stories of female athletes and their parents.” Additionally, Trump “does expect the Olympic Committee and the NCAA to no longer allow men to compete in women’s sports,” Leavitt said. While Trump does not have legal authority over the International Olympic Committee or National Collegiate Athletics Association, Leavitt said the executive action “starts a very public pressure campaign on these organizations.” “He expects these organizations to comply with this federal executive order,” she said. In his remarks on Wednesday, Trump said he has instructed Secretary of State Marco Rubio to “make clear to the International Olympic Committees … that America categorically rejects transgender lunacy.” And there are plans to convene state attorneys general to enforce “laws on the books protecting women’s sports” at the state level, the official said. Trump on Wednesday is expected to meet with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who in 2023 signed a state law banning trans athletes in college sports in his state. Rubio, the official added, will be using bodies like the United Nations to promote the administration’s stance through reports on gender issues. The executive action also calls for a review of visa policies: “If you are coming into the country and you are claiming that you are a woman, but you are a male here to compete against women, we’re going to be reviewing that for fraud,” the official said. Trump’s acting on a divisive campaign issue In his first week of his second term, Trump signed an executive order that prevented transgender people from serving in the military, resurrecting an order he initially implemented in 2017 during his first term but was later reversed by President Joe Biden’s administration. Trump’s order is facing a legal fight brought on by six transgender service members and two transgender people who want to enlist. Another order Trump signed sought to have transgender women detained in federal facilities be housed in men’s facilities. Three transgender women housed in women’s facilities sued over the policy, and a federal judge earlier this week blocked the Trump administration from enforcing it. In the closing months of the campaign, Trump and his allies poured millions into television ads attacking then-Vice President Kamala Harris over her past support of certain rights for transgender people — a message spread during nationally televised NFL games, college football broadcasts and in battleground states. Republicans up and down the ballot spent staggering sums on TV ads on the issue, despite most voters saying it’s a topic that wasn’t a top priority for them in the 2024 election. Trump, for example, repeatedly invoked Imane Khelif, an Algerian female Olympic boxer that he baselessly said “transitioned” into manhood. Even before launching his 2024 presidential campaign, Trump escalated his rhetoric against the LGBTQ community — specifically transgender Americans — in ways that he largely avoided in the lead-up to his 2016 win and throughout his four years in Washington. At an appearance in July 2022, Trump voiced his opposition to transgender women participating in women’s athletics, marveling at the applause it generated and insisting his advisers had advocated against including it in his remarks. “They said, ‘Don’t do it,’” Trump said. “And it gets the biggest hand. It’s crazy.” Critics have said Trump seeks to shape policy around an issue that does not exist on a large scale. Out of the approximately 510,000 athletes who compete across the NCAA, fewer than 10 are known to be transgender, NCAA President Charlie Baker told a Senate panel last year. By Betsy Klein and Michael Williams, CNN CNN’s Steve Contorno and David Wright contributed to this report.
