Donald Trump vows to ban transgender women from women’s sports if re-elected

‘We will ban men from participating in women’s sports,’ Trump says

Former president Donald Trump vowed to ban transgender women from women’s sports if he returns to power in 2024.

“We will ban men from participating in women’s sports,” said Mr Trump, while addressing a rally in Texas on Saturday.  “So ridiculous!” he added.

Without mentioning her name, Mr Trump referred to Lia Thomas, a transgender swimmer from the University of Pennsylvania, and went on to falsely claim that she broke an 11-year-old swimming record by 38 seconds.

“Did you see the man who was in a swimming team that I know very well?” he asked as he misgendered the athlete. “The record held for like 11 years, he beat it by 38 seconds.”

Ms Thomas, who came out as a trans woman in 2019, was competing in the 2021 Zippy Invitational as a part of the University of Pennsylvania’s swimming team when she broke three records on 3 December – causing furore among conservatives.

However, while Ms Thomas won the 1,650-yard freestyle race and beat her teammate Anna Kalandadze by 38 seconds, she did not set a record in that event referred to by Mr Trump, reported NBC News. She had set school and Ivy League records in 200yd freestyle and 500yd freestyle by smaller margins.

However, many attacked her, sharing the footage of her swims as an example of how fast she was compared to her fellow competitors.

This is not the first time that the former president has mocked transgender athletes. Earlier during his speech in February, Mr Trump called transgender women athletes “biological males” and complained that records in women’s sports were being “smashed” by transgender competitors.

“A lot of new records are being broken in women’s sports, I hate to say that ladies, but you have got a lot of new records that are being shattered,” Mr Trump said in his speech during the Conservative Political Action Conference organised in February last year.

“Young girls and women are incensed that they are now being forced to compete against those who are biological males. That is not good for women,” he added.