The United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USOPC) have published an updated “Athlete Safety Policy.” The new version is to align with an .
The update effectively bans from competing in women’s sports in the .
Why has the USOPC updated its policy?
In the 27-page document with the updated “Athlete Safety Policy,” the USOPC does not mention the word “transgender.”
However, in a new subsection titled “Additional Requirements,” it states that “The USOPC will continue to collaborate with various stakeholders with oversight responsibilities” to ensure that “women have a fair and safe competition environment consistent with Executive Order 14201.”
On Tuesday, USOPC president Gene Sykes and chief executive officer Sarah Hirshland sent a letter to the US Olympic community explaining the policy change.
“As a federally chartered organization, we have an obligation to comply with federal expectations,” they wrote as reported by US media outlets including ESPN and the Washington Post.
“Our revised policy emphasizes the importance of ensuring fair and safe competition environments for women.”
The letter also said that national governing bodies will have to “update their applicable policies in alignment.”
The USOPC’s change follows a similar one at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) earlier this year. The NCAA changed its policy a day after Trump’s executive order. It now limits competitors in women’s sports to athletes assigned female at birth.
What was Trump’s executive order on transgender athletes?
In February this year, Trump signed Executive Order 14201, titled “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports.” This order means that if schools or institutions allow transgender athletes to compete in teams that do not match the sex they were assigned at birth, they could face the withdrawal of federal funding.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio was also tasked with getting the International Olympic Committee to change “the standards governing Olympic sporting events to promote fairness, safety, and the best interests of female athletes” by using “all appropriate and available measures.”
The executive order is similar to other measures introduced by the Trump administration. Earlier this year, they also .
Reactions to the de facto ban on transgender athletes from women’s events
Critics of the executive order argue that there is dominating women’s sports on a larger scale. Opponents also warn these orders will not create fair solutions in sport and are instead likely to deepen political polarization.
There are also concerns for the mental health of young transgender athletes, should they be excluded from sport. This comes alongside worries that women with chromosome abnormalities could also be targeted by unscientific “genetic tests”, and that it puts athletes under scrutiny not applied to their male counterparts.
The National Women’s Law Center condemned the move. “By giving in to the political demands, the USOPC is sacrificing the needs and safety of its own athletes,” said the organization’s president and CEO, Fatima Goss Graves, in a statement.
In several states across the , laws bar transgender women and girls from participating in certain competitions. Some of these policies have been blocked in court after critics challenged the policies as discriminatory and cruel.
IOC president Kirsty Coventry has previously stated an effort to “protect the female category.” Trump has said he wants the IOC to change everything “having to do with this absolutely ridiculous subject.”
So far, the IOC allows individual sports federations to set their own rules at the Olympics. In swimming, cycling and track and field, stricter have already been passed, with athletes who went through male puberty banned from women’s events.
The next Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games are to be held in Los Angeles in 2028.
Edited by: Elizabeth Schumacher
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