A bill aimed at restricting “biological men” from participating in women’s sports passed the House of Representatives Tuesday. The anti-transgender initiative is on its way to the upper chamber thanks to the contributions of two Democrats, who sided with 216 Republicans.
H.R. 28, titled “The Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act,” would modify Title IX to singularly recognize an individual’s sex based on their “reproductive biology and genetics at birth.” The measure would effectively bar educational institutions, which oversee youth sports across the country, from allowing transgender women and girls from participating in women’s sports—else they risk suspending or terminating their federal funding.
“It shall be a violation of subsection (a) 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,” the text of the bill reads.
H.R. 28 also compels the Comptroller General to conduct a biased survey documenting the “adverse psychological, developmental, participatory, and sociological results” to cisgender girls when transgender athletes are allowed to compete alongside them.
Even lawmakers who remain critical of transgender inclusion in sports deemed the bill too broad and too dangerous to advance, claiming that the bill could realistically lead to cisgender girls who don’t fit traditional norms or beauty standards—such as being “too tall,” “too strong,” or even “too good” at sports—to hand over sensitive medical information to government officials, or even be forced to have their genitals inspected.
“Because it fails to distinguish between children and adults and different levels of athletics, school-aged kids who simply want to play recreational sports and build camaraderie like everybody else could be targeted by the federal government,” Democratic Representative Seth Moulton said Tuesday. “My kids play co-ed sports today just as I did when I was their age, and I don’t want any kids their age subjected to the invasive violations of personal privacy this bill allows.”
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