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U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon unveiled arguably the biggest step yet in President Donald Trump’s mission to combat trans inclusion in women’s sports on Tuesday.
The announcement that the University of Pennsylvania had come to a resolution with the administration over its handling of the Lia Thomas situation years ago closed a controversy that ignited a cultural debate when Thomas competed in the NCAA women’s swimming championship in 2022.
University of Pennsylvania swimmer Lia Thomas, left, and Kentucky swimmer Riley Gaines react after finishing tied for 5th in the 200 Freestyle finals at the NCAA Swimming and Diving Championships on March 18, 2022 at the McAuley Aquatic Center in Atlanta. (Rich von Biberstein/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
The Thomas saga at the 2022 NCAA championships is largely considered a cultural turning point in the national debate over transgender athletes in women’s sports. At the time, current prominent conservative activist Riley Gaines was just a dental student who had to settle for a tie with Thomas in one of the NCAA championship events.
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McMahon followed the situation through the news that year.
“The first thing when I looked and saw the difference in size between Riley Gaines and Lia Thomas, I said, ‘oh my gosh, this is just totally unfair,'” McMahon told Fox News Digital, recalling when Gaines infamously tied Thomas in that year’s competition. “To think, given all that, she tied, which is amazing, but it was just totally unfair. She should have walked away with that, coming in clearly for the fifth place, and that just didn’t happen.”
McMahon said she hopes that Tuesday’s announcement sends a message to other girls in high school and college across the country.
“I think those girls, hopefully they will look at Riley and Paula [Scanlan] and others as real role models and give them the strength to stand up,” McMahon said.
The department previously launched an investigation into UPenn on Feb. 6. The Trump administration later froze $175 million in funding for the school on March 20. Then, on April 28, the Education Department’s Office of Civil Rights announced its investigation concluded that UPenn did violate Title IX in its handling of the Thomas situation.
Now, UPenn has agreed to implement a strict policy keeping trans athletes out of women’s sports and issue apologies to all the women who have been impacted.
However, McMahon’s work doesn’t end with UPenn. The Department of Education and other branches of Trump’s administration are fighting the issue on multiple fronts, with an active lawsuit against the state of Maine for refusing to comply with Trump’s mandate on the issue. The administration is also in a standoff with California and Minnesota over the issue, as well as those states that have aggressively defied Trump’s mandate on the issue.
McMahon hopes UPenn’s agreement sends a message to those states.
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Former NCAA Division 1 swimmer Paula Scanlan testifies before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government. (C-SPAN)
“Our sincere hope is that they absolutely recognize what they’re going to have to do relative to comply with Title IX. It is the law,” McMahon said. “There are federal funds that have been withheld and withdrawn, so there’s penalties involved in this. But it’s actually just the right thing to do, it’s common sense to do, that men should not compete in women’s sports.”
On the same day that McMahon’s department announced its investigation against UPenn, it also announced an investigation against San Jose State University for its handling of former transgender volleyball player Blaire Fleming. The situation involving Fleming culminated in a nationally-publicized scandal in the 2024 fall season, which included multiple lawsuits by San Jose State and other Mountain West volleyball players.
Recently, Fox News Digital reported that the Mountain West Conference hired the same law firm to investigate the trans athlete’s misconduct allegations that the conference was using to defend the athlete’s eligibility for the conference tournament in court.
Fox News Digital reported on June 24 that the Mountain West had hired the firm Willkie Farr & Gallagher to investigate allegations against Fleming of conspiring with an opponent to have teammate Brooke Slusser harmed during an Oct. 3 game.
Mountain West hired the firm to handle the investigation in the same month that the same firm represented the conference to protect Fleming’s eligibility in a request for a preliminary injunction to have the trans athlete disqualified from women’s competition and the conference tournament.
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Blaire Fleming of the San Jose State Spartans looks on during the second set against the Air Force Falcons at Falcon Court at East Gym on Oct. 19, 2024 in Colorado Springs, Colorado. (Andrew Wevers/Getty Images)
Now, with the UPenn situation resolved, McMahon will continue working to address the SJSU investigation.
“Our investigation will continue,” McMahon said of the developing situation with SJSU.
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