GOP bills ban transgender athletes from non-coed sports
Female athletes back measures; Evers would likely veto legislation
MADISON - Republican women in the state Legislature are proposing legislation that would ban transgender athletes from participating in sports at every grade level and in college unless the teams are coed.
The move — part of at least a dozen proposals across the country — drew a heavy rebuke from the transgender community and its advocates, who say the effort pushes a harmful message to transgender children that they don’t deserve to live like everyone else.
Flanked by female athletes and Olympic speed skater Bonnie Blair by video, bill author Rep. Barb Dittrich argued at a Capitol press conference Tuesday that the legislation is needed to ensure female athletes aren’t competing against someone with insurmountable physical advantages.
“I did not spend the last three years with a personal trainer after school everyday, waking up at 4:30 in the morning to work out before school, my summers practicing and competing, and traveling the country to play lacrosse while maintaining two jobs to have my opportunities and athletic accomplishments diminished,” said Airiana Lynch, a sophomore girls lacrosse player at Arrowhead Union High School in Waukesha County.
Rep. Janel Brandtjen, R-Menomonee Falls, cited the uneven physical advantage her husband had in competitive swimming, which they both participated in as college students.
“My life is forever changed by being able to compete but there is no doubt that I could never beat my husband,” she said. “That’s the biology, the reality. And honestly, you’ll ruin women’s sports forever. Why would you compete if you knew you couldn’t win? We want a fair playing field.”
The bills face an all but certain veto from Democratic Gov. Tony Evers, who opposes legislation that puts restrictions on gay and transgender children and adults.
As state superintendent, he opposed a 2015 bill that would have prevented transgender children from using school bathrooms that were not assigned to their biological sex designated by a doctor at birth.
“My message to Wisconsin’s transgender kids and students today is simple: I see you. You are welcome, you are wanted, and you belong,” Evers said in a statement and on Twitter.
Advocates for gay and transgender communities also held a protest outside the state Capitol during the press conference.
“Lawmakers’ suggestion that student-athletes are trying to game the system for competitive advantage is nonsensical and impractical. It simply does not happen,” Human Rights Campaign state legislative director Cathryn Oakley said in a statement.
Sen. Kelda Roys, D-Madison, tweeted “Transgendered youth are not pawns to be used in political games meant to divide our communities. These bills are wrong. Don’t legislate hate.”
Dittrich said if Evers doesn’t sign the legislation, he’s a sexist.
“If the governor is truly for women, why would he not sign something like this?” she said. “It is wholly unfair for a woman to be competing and think she’s only competing against other females.”
The legislation would go against guidance from high school and collegiate sports associations. The NCAA has allowed transgender athletes who have undergone hormone treatment to be able to compete for a decade. In a 2011 handbook on guidance for colleges, association officials wrote concerns about unfair competitive advantages are based on assumptions that are not well-founded.
“Transgender girls who medically transition at an early age do not go through a male puberty, and therefore their participation in athletics as girls does not raise the same equity concerns that arise when transgender women transition after puberty,” the association wrote.
“Transgender women display a great deal of physical variation, just as there is a great deal of natural variation in physical size and ability among non-transgender women and men.”
Under Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association policies, transgender girls may participate on girls teams if they have had one year of testosterone suppression therapy.
Sheri Swokowski, a transgender woman who is a former board member of LGBT advocacy group Fair Wisconsin, on Tuesday also pointed out the International Olympic Committee has permitted transgender athletes to compete for two decades.
“Have you noticed trans athletes sweeping everything?” she tweeted.
Blair, who competed in four Olympics, said she supported such legislation because of her experience taking tests to prove she was female and having to compete against others who were taking performance-enhancing drugs.
“Athletes should not have to compete in an unfair environment and women’s sports should be protected,” she said in a taped message played at Tuesday’s press conference.