Sports edict makes Trump a feminist hero

As a crowd of female athletes and little girls in tracksuits clustered around his desk, President Trump seemed unable to believe his luck. “What a nice picture this is,” he declared, signing his executive order entitled “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports” to a trilling chorus of “thank you, Mr President!”.

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Yet here was Trump applauded by women, and not just Republicans but lifelong Democrats or previously apolitical sports stars like Riley Gaines, who turned campaigner after being forced to race 6ft 1in trans swimmer Lia Thomas. At the White House, Trump recalled watching that race: “It was ridiculous, frankly.”

And the nation agreed. A New York Times poll found 79 per cent of Americans (including 67 per cent of Democrats) thought men didn’t belong in women’s sports, making it probably the most popular executive order ever. “My administration will not stand by and let men beat and batter female athletes,” said Trump. “It’s common sense more than anything else.”

[…] So why did it take Trump to say this, and why did the Democrats gift their worst enemy such an easy win, allowing Trump — who in another executive order just banned all federal funding to abortion services — to be hailed as a feminist president?

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The Democrats listened only to the extreme activist lobby, like the American Civil Liberties Union and GLAAD, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, who spun science-denying sophistry to “prove” putting males in women’s sports was fine and might even improve female performances.
For a quiet life, governing bodies, colleges, coaches, corporate sponsors, broadcasters all fell in line. But now Trump, the impudent boy, has broken the spell.

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In his speech, Trump announced that all males hoping to compete in women’s events at the 2028 LA Olympics will be denied visas. It will not come to that. The International Olympic Committee presidency is being contested and all candidates, not just the trenchant World Athletics president Seb Coe, have vowed to defend the female category. They cite the Paris Olympics debacle, when outgoing president Thomas Bach said that holding passports stating they were female qualified two biological male boxers to fight women. Both won gold. The world witnessed sex denialism at its most dangerous, ludicrous and unjust.

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