Republican senators reintroduced a bill on March 1 aimed at protecting female athletes and ensuring fairness and safety in women’s sports across the United States.
The “Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act,” first introduced unsuccessfully in 2021, would preserve Title IX protections for female athletes, which ban discrimination on the basis of sex in sports programs and require all educational institutions in the country to reward male and female athletes equally.
The bill was introduced by Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) and co-sponsored by 21 other GOP lawmakers, including Sens. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), Mike Lee (R-Utah), James Lankford (R-Okla.), Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Roger Marshall (R-Kan.), and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.).
According to the senators, the bill will counteract President Joe Biden’s anticipated plans to finalize rules in May that would force institutions to allow biological males to share women-only spaces and compete in women’s sports.
The Biden administration’s Department of Education (DOE) proposed a series of regulations in 2022 to amend Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 to include “gender identity” in the definition of sex discrimination in education programs. The move came on the 50th anniversary of the federal civil rights law’s enactment.
Biden’s administration is expected to roll out further rules in May detailing how Title IX applies to biologically male transgender athletes competing in women’s sports.
Title IX Has ‘Empowered Young Women’
Tuberville’s bill will ensure that Title IX provisions treat gender as “recognized based solely on a person’s reproductive biology and genetics at birth.”It also bans recipients of federal funding from operating, sponsoring, or facilitating sports programs that allow male individuals to take part in women’s sporting events.
The bill has been endorsed by the Independent Women’s Forum, Concerned Women for America, and Heritage Action for America.
In a statement, Tuberville cited his experience as a coach. He began his career coaching high school girls basketball, where he said he witnessed firsthand the positive impacts of Title IX.
“For more than 50 years, this law has empowered young women to grow personally, compete professionally, and receive scholarships to further their education,” Tuberville said in his announcement of the bill.
“The positive impacts of a fair playing field in women’s sports are unmatched, but the Biden administration is forcing female athletes to the sidelines by allowing biological males to compete where they do not belong. It’s unfair, it’s unsafe, and it’s wrong. We cannot stand by and let girls and women in sports lose to the radical left’s agenda,” Tuberville added.
Crapo said in his announcement that the protections provided to women and girls by Title IX are “being challenged by the Left’s radical ideologies.”
Penny Nance, president and CEO of Concerned Women for America Legislative Action Committee, said “it’s time for Congress to stop injustice and discrimination against female student athletes in their own sports.”
“Never again should female athletes lose their trophies, their scholarships, and their dignity to males,” Nance said.
Biden Says Updated Regulations Needed
In a separate statement reacting to the new bill, Christiana Kiefer, senior counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom, said she welcomed what she called “commonsense legislation.”“Girls shouldn’t be sidelined in their own sports. Women fought long and hard for equal athletic opportunities and allowing males to compete in girls’ sports reverses 50 years of advances secured for women under Title IX,” Kiefer said.
Their letter cited concerns that the new rules will undermine the protections granted under Title IX. They also note that the department’s efforts would force institutions to “allow males to compete in women’s and girls’ athletic competitions and to use their locker rooms and other private facilities.”
However, Biden—who pledged to change the Title IX rules during his presidential campaign—and his administration have said that updated regulations to the law are needed to ensure that “no person experiences sex discrimination in education.”
