Shortly after President Trump signed his executive order banning males from competing in female sports, National Collegiate Athletic Association president Charlie Baker announced that he and the NCAA Board of Governors would convene to align their policy with the directive. On February 6, the NCAA released an updated “Participation Policy for Transgender Student-Athletes,” which Baker described as a new “national standard” that “brings much needed clarity as we modernize college sports for today's student-athletes.”
While the new policy might seem reasonable at a glance, a closer look reveals a giant loophole that could be used to defy the clear intent of Trump’s executive order. In fact, the updated protocols could make it easier for males to compete in women’s sports.
The NCAA’s policy has several troubling features. First, it deliberately avoids referencing objective biology, and defines “woman” as a “gender identity” rather than as an “adult human female”—the language of the executive order. Further, it defines “gender identity” circularly as “an individual’s own internal sense of their gender.”
Second, though the policy states that “a student-athlete assigned male at birth may not compete on a women’s team,” and that eligibility will be determined based on the sex “marked on [the athlete’s] birth records,” this standard is easily manipulated. In rare cases, though more commonly in developing countries, doctors may misidentify a male newborn’s sex due to female-like or ambiguous genitalia caused by a developmental condition. The NCAA’s policy does nothing to keep such misclassified males out of women’s sports. Just this summer, a loophole of this kind allowed two male athletes, Imane Khelif and Lin Yu-Ting, to compete as women and win gold medals in boxing at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
The larger issue, however, is that 44 U.S. states and many countries allow individuals to amend their birth certificates to reflect their self-declared “gender identity.” Progressive lawmakers are keenly aware of this loophole, which is why officials like Washington governor Bob Ferguson are expediting approval of their constituents’ birth-certificate-modification requests. In a recent X post, Ferguson stated, “[T]he Department of Health will now process all requests to change gender designation on birth certificates within three business days. Previously, there was as much as a 10 month wait.”
Since sex is a matter of objective biology, any policy aiming to maintain the integrity of women’s sports must incorporate an active screening process rooted in empirical reality. This could include a cheek swab (Barr body) test to verify an athlete’s sex chromosomes, or a direct test for the SRY gene, which determines male development. Simply relying on changeable birth certificates is not a viable solution.
Many are sounding the alarm over the new policy. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has filed a preliminary injunction against the NCAA, describing the new protocols as a “sleight of hand . . . designed to intentionally deceive consumers into believing that biological men are no longer allowed to participate in women’s sports.” Lawmakers, journalists, leading women’s sports organizations, and prominent female athletes such as Riley Gaines have also publicly rejected the NCAA’s new policy.
This policy must be rejected outright. The NCAA should return to the drawing board to craft a policy that genuinely upholds fairness in women’s sports.
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