US President Donald Trump is anticipated to sign an executive order on Wednesday prohibiting transgender athletes from playing women’s sports, sources have confirmed.
According to a White House source, the order will set broad guidelines for sex and sports policy and will instruct federal agencies, including the Department of Justice, to interpret federal Title IX regulations as forbidding transgender women and girls from participating in female sports.
The order with the title, “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports,” will ensure immediate enforcement against all schools and athletic associations that “deny women single-sex sports and single-sex locker rooms”.
Sports bodies like the NCAA are expected to change their rules in accordance with the order immediately after it is signed, according to a senior administration official in The White House.
“We’re a national governing body and we follow federal law,” NCAA President Charlie Baker told Republican senators at a court hearing in December. “Clarity on this issue at the federal level would be very helpful.”
According to sources, Trump will be signing the order during a signing ceremony that will include athletes, coaches, and activists who have opposed transgender athletes’ participation in women’s sports. The ceremony will be attended by at least 60 people, including Riley Gaines, a former swimmer for the University of Kentucky.
(ABC)
