Attacks on Transgender Athletes Will Harm All Students

In the barrage of laws and policies attacking the transgender, gender non-conforming, and intersex communities, young athletes have been disproportionately targeted. While not new, these attacks are becoming increasingly common – there are currently 25 states with laws preventing transgender children and youth from joining a sports team that corresponds with their gender identity, and 2 states with regulations or agency policies preventing them. [1] However, more of these policies are being proposed in Pennsylvania and nationally. These laws are not only discriminatory, but they harm every student athlete, regardless of gender or sex, by dramatically undermining their rights to privacy and dignity.

1. H.R. 28 in the United States Congress

In January 2025, the United States House of Representatives passed H.R. 28, an extremely harmful and transphobic bill which will threaten students’ rights – specifically targeting transgender students but undoubtedly having repercussions for their cisgender peers as well. The bill seeks to prohibit transgender and intersex girls from participating in girls’ and women’s sports teams, both K-12 and college sports teams.

Even more disastrously, the bill would amend Title IX, the federal education law which bars sex-based discrimination. The law would instead define “sex” as based solely on an individual’s biology at birth.

The bill itself includes the following provisions:

It shall be a violation… for a recipient of Federal financial assistance who operates, sponsors, or facilitates an athletic program or activity to permit a person whose sex is male to participate in an athletic program or activity that is designated for women or girls.
For the purposes of this subsection, sex shall be recognized based solely on a person’s reproductive biology and genetics at birth.
For the purposes of this subsection, the term ‘athletic programs and activities’ includes, but is not limited to, all programs or activities that are provided conditional upon participation with any athletic team.

The bill is moving quickly to the United States Senate for a vote.

2. S.B. 9 in Pennsylvania

In February 2025, Republican senators in the Pennsylvania State Senate introduced S.B. 9, referred to as the “Save Women’s Sports Act.” This legislation would bar transgender girls from competing on women’s sports teams and seeks to limit them to “biological females."

The current policy for the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association allows school principals to decide on criteria for joining a sport’s team, including whether transgender or intersex students can join the team that corresponds with their gender identity. S.B. 9 seeks to eliminate the ability for local decision-making, instead enforcing a broad, state-wide, discriminatory policy at the detriment of athletes, regardless of gender.

This bill is currently pending in the Education Committee. If it makes it though committee and is passed, it would make discrimination against transgender athletes the law of the Commonwealth.

3. “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports” from the Trump Administration

In its February 5, 2025 executive order, Trump directs the Secretary of Education to rescind federal funding from public schools, including both K-12 schools and universities, which allow transgender women to participate on women’s sports teams. The order also targets the upcoming 2028 Olympic games being hosted in Los Angeles, CA, directing the Secretary of State and Secretary of Homeland Security to screen transgender athletes with visas seeking to enter the United States for competitions. The order also directs the Secretary of State to “use all appropriate and available measures to see that the International Olympic Committee amends the standards governing Olympic sporting events” to abide by the Trump administration’s transphobic and prejudiced views.

What Do These Efforts Mean?

Laws like these are not new; they are merely the latest attempt to target and penalize transgender children and youth. These efforts are dangerous and harmful to all students, both transgender and cisgender.

Targeting transgender athletes deprives them of the social and emotional development that comes from teamwork and community. But cisgender students will suffer under this legislation, as well. Lawmakers opposing H.R. 28 argued that it does not outline how schools could, or should, enforce the bill. Instead, it will almost certainly open the door to testing and other investigations of children which are invasive and degrading. U.S. Representative Suzanne Bonamici of Oregon said, “There is no way this so-called protection bill could be enforced without opening the door to harassment and privacy violations… Will students have to take exams to prove they’re a girl? We’re already seeing examples of harassment and questioning of girls who may not conform to stereotypical feminine roles. Will they be subject to demands for medical tests, private information that’s intrusive, offensive and unacceptable?”

A very public example of this type of witch hunt occurred during the 2024 Paris Olympics when Algeria’s Imane Khelif was harassed and questioned about her eligibility to compete in women’s boxing. Khelif, a cisgender woman, was repeatedly accused of being a transgender woman or biologically male because of her talent, her masculinity, and her appearance. She was subjected to online harassment about her gender, including from public figures like author J.K. Rowling and Vice President J.D. Vance. Khelif said about these allegations, “I send a message to all the people of the world to uphold the Olympic principles, to refrain from bullying all athletes, because this thing has effects, massive effects. It can destroy people. It can kill people's thoughts, spirit and mind.”

The International Olympic Committee maintains that “[t]he practice of sport is a human right. Every individual must have access to the practice of sport, without discrimination of any kind.”

What Can We Do?

There are people and organizations fighting against these efforts, and there are steps that each of us can take to help.

Two transgender students in New Hampshire are challenging the executive order through litigation, calling the order “a broad intention to deny transgender people legal protections and to purge transgender people from society.”

Concerned individuals can contact their U.S. Senators and urge them to vote no on H.R. 28. The U.S. Senators for Pennsylvania are:

Senator John Fetterman

https://www.fetterman.senate.gov/contact/

(202) 224-4254

Senator David McCormick

https://www.mccormick.senate.gov/

(202) 224-6324

If you are outside of Pennsylvania, you can find your U.S. Senators and their contact information here.

[1] See https://www.lgbtmap.org/equality-maps/youth/sports_participation_bans.