When I arrived in the UK six years ago as an asylum seeker, I was stunned by how LGBTQI+ friendly the country seemed. Compared to Ukraine and Russia – where I had previously lived – it felt almost like time travel.
I’ve known I was trans since I was four years old. But it was only here, in the UK, at the age of 24, that I finally felt safe enough to come out.
Since then, much has changed. The political climate has shifted. Laws have shifted.
In 2015, the annual Rainbow Map and Index by ILGA-Europe ranked the UK as the most LGBTQI+ friendly country in Europe. But in the latest rankings released on 14 May, the UK has fallen to 22nd place, with an overall score of just 46 per cent. That makes it the second-worst performer on LGBTQI+ rights in Western Europe and Scandinavia.
This drop isn’t abstract – it reflects growing hostility, dangerous rhetoric, and policies that especially target trans people.
The recent Supreme Court ruling that defines “woman” as “biological woman” under equality law is a particularly cruel institutional decision. Its consequences for trans, non-binary, and gender non-conforming people may not even be fully visible yet – but they will be far-reaching.
Transmasculine people like me may soon be under direct attack as well. And then, as history shows, the broader LGBTQI+ community often follows. For people already facing multiple forms of oppression – like refugees and people seeking asylum – the danger is even greater.
So as Pride Month begins, we must ask ourselves: What does Pride mean right now? How did we get here—and where do we go from here? What does this mean for LGBTQI+ refugees in particular, and why is it important for the community in general?
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The Cass Review: a turning point
I knew something was deeply wrong when the Cass Review was published in April 2024, and the NHS began blocking transgender youth from accessing gender-affirming care.
Outside the LGBTQI+ community, few people seemed to care. Even many liberals and left-leaning voices accepted it as “reasonable”.
But this decision has already caused immense harm. The review was widely criticised by both UK and international experts, but the damage was swift – especially for transgender kids. As a former trans child myself, I know the mental health cost of being denied gender-affirming care. I still live with that impact today.
And it always starts the same way: The first attacks come for LGBTQI+ youth, because they are not taken seriously because they are considered to be “too immature” to think for themselves. Just like refugees, who are seen as “barbarians” from less developed societies.
Those at the intersection suffer the most.
A dangerous shift in politics
Despite its history as a progressive party, many trans activists now say Labour is doing more harm to LGBTQI+ people than recent Tory governments.
Labour is even continuing the particularly dangerous for LGBTQI+ people anti-immigration policies introduced under Rishi Sunak. Prime minister Keir Starmer recently said the UK is considering sending rejected people seeking safety to third countries.
As someone who has worked with LGBTQI+ refugees globally, I can say: This is extremely risky for trans people.
Trans people seeking asylum already face daily harassment, even within refugee communities. Most third countries lack the legal protections they need. Deportation could cut them off from hormone therapy or vital healthcare.
And all this is happening as far-right movements gain more support. The rise of the transphobic, anti-migrant Reform Party, the far-right riots last summer, and increasing global conservatism are life-threatening for LGBTQI+ refugees.
“It should be not about past victories, but present dangers,” Ayman Eckford writes (Ayman Eckford)
Sometimes the threat is physical – being attacked for looking non-White and gender non-conforming. Sometimes it’s quieter but just as harmful – denial of healthcare, legal protections, or safety.
As an expert by experience for the mental health charity Rethink, I know how hard it is to access therapy even for cisgender, straight British people.
Now imagine being a trans person seeking asylum. You’re under constant pressure, facing daily dehumanization – and if you finally reach out for help?
The therapist might be transphobic. Or xenophobic. Or both.
Maybe you can’t fully express yourself in English.
Maybe the waiting list is too long.
In the end, the suicide risk for trans and LGBTQI+ refugees is terrifyingly high. And still, much of the broader LGBTQI+ movement stays silent.
Pride as Protest: What Must Be Done
So what does it mean to celebrate Pride in this context?
In recent years, Pride has become a celebration – of victories, of corporate support, of police apologies. But we must remember: Pride was born as a protest. Today, it must return to its roots. It must be about resistance.
It should be not about past victories, but present dangers.
Not “love is love,” but “the lives of our queer and trans siblings are at risk.”
I know that for many people — even some within the LGBTQI+ community — lives like mine don’t matter.
But history shows us: The erosion of human rights always begins with minorities.
Just as the attacks on trans kids marked the start of broader attacks on LGBTQI+ people in the UK, the targeting of trans refugees and LGBTQI+ people seeking sanctuary is not the end of the story of oppression —it’s only the beginning. But we may change this story, and this is what Pride Month should be about.
“You ready?” the doctor asked, syringe poised. “Yep,” I replied tentatively. “One, two, three.” He jabbed my right thigh into my muscle. Even though I’d been preparing for this, I’d never had a shot in my leg before. Almost immediately, it felt achy. As that first drop of testosterone hit my bloodstream, I violated the rules of my women’s hockey league and said goodbye to my life as a professional hockey player and my identity as an elite athlete. It hurt.
As a kid, I always played women’s sports. I didn’t think too much about how men and women are divided in athletics. I was celebrated as a woman athlete, and the more I accomplished, the deeper it became interwoven with my own identity, and my place in the world. But as my understanding of my gender identity as a transman began to grow, my identity as an athlete on the women’s side started to conflict with who I knew I was inside. I knew that taking testosteroneis what I wanted and ultimately needed in order for society to view me as a man. It’s important to note that this is my own unique vision for my future. Not all trans people follow this path or feel the need to “pass” as cisgender, and that is valid. But for me, it was vital but not an option for me while I still played women’s hockey.
By 2016, when I was playing professionally with the Buffalo Beauts of the NWHL (National Women’s Hockey League), I was struggling more and more in my double life outside of the rink and felt like I was in limbo waiting for my real life to begin after sports. I didn’t want to hide anymore and came out publicly as a trans man through an ESPN article that went viral. I was still unable to physically transition but a social transition was possible by changing my name and pronouns within the hockey world. But being constantly misgendered and bound by an assigned-female legal name outside of the rink is what prompted me to retire from women’s hockey sooner than I would have if I wasn’t trans. Shortly after I announced my retirement through the New York Times, I knew the time had come and finally mustered up the courage to call my doctor about testosterone and pursuing a medical transition. While it was crucial, and even lifesaving, for me to abandon women’s hockey so I could finally begin to live as my true self, it was still excruciating to have to make that call.
Sports, specifically hockey, saved my life and I truly believe I wouldn’t be here without sports. It was a space for me to gain confidence, friendships, a sense of self, discipline and find pride in what my body could do. For many sports is a place of joy and refuge from the stresses of life and now that is being taken away from a group of people who need it the most, kids who need it the most. .
Today, gender-diverse people, athletes and non-athletes alike, are facing unprecedented threats to their existence. This includes their right to play sports on the team of their choice. The discussion is riddled with misinformation and disinformation that has even captured the attention of those who say they support LGBTQ+ rights. And the worsening struggles of trans athletes is occurring while their access to proper healthcare is being eroded. The sports world has become the newest battleground over the fight for equality.
Here, drawing on my book Let Us Play: Winning the Battle for Gender Diverse Athletes, which I wrote with my sister Rachel Browne who is an investigative journalist, is a takedown of the five myths that permeate the debate over trans athletes:
Trans women and girls are not a threat to women’s sports; nor are they dominating
Until the recent outcry over trans women’s participation in sports, trans athletes had been participating in sports aligned with their gender identity, from recreational levels to the Olympics, for decades with very little controversy and pushback. Sports regulators and organizations, like the NCAA, had implemented policies to help include trans athletes. It really wasn’t until former University of Pennsylvania swimmer Lia Thomas became the first trans woman to win an NCAA Division I championship title in 2022 that trans athletes became vilified.
But Thomas’ story actually proves that trans women are not a threat to women’s sports and that inclusion policies do work. Thomas won a single race by 1.75 seconds, and came in last in another race. Thomas abided by all the NCAA rules at that time and is a case study for why exclusion is unnecessary. It’s important to keep in mind that these policies were meant to promote fair competition, not to prevent trans athletes from excelling in their sport.
Trans women rarely, if ever, won against their cisgender counterparts. To this day, not a single openly trans woman has won an Olympic medal in the women’s category. It’s abundantly clear that trans women and girls do not, and have never, “dominated” in women’s sports at any level — cisgender women do.
When we get wrapped up over unfounded fears of trans women dominating women’s sports, we easily lose sight of how the vast majority of people who play sports do not aspire to be an elite athlete. Most people play for exercise, community, and joy. Trans women and girls, like all athletes, are motivated by the love of their sport, not a singular desire to win.
Sports were never “fair” in the first place
The rallying cry of those who oppose trans women and girls’ participation in women’s sports is that it is not fair. This assumes that sports are, at their core, pure and equal for all. This isn’t the case for any sport, men’s or women’s. If you look at any sports team or event, you’ll see athletes come in different sizes, skill sets, and other varying attributes that contribute to their success and longevity as an athlete. But the biggest and most tangible factor that contributes to an athlete’s ability to excel is their access to financial resources and community support. Hockey, for instance, has numerous barriers to entry, including the cost of the equipment, training and coaching, as well as the time commitments for practices and tournaments. Players who can afford all of this, and have caregivers who can help facilitate it, are automatically at a greater advantage over everyone else. This is a reality for many other sports.
If politicians and advocates really cared about protecting and promoting women’s sports, they’d fight for equal resources for training facilities and equipment, as well as equal pay for professional athletes. They would talk about fairness through the lens of socioeconomic equality. The conversation around trans participation in sports has never been about true fairness, it’s about exclusion and upholding the status quo that favors the gender binary and the wealthy.
Biology and hormones do not automatically lead to athletic advantage
First off, all people of all genders have both estrogen and testosterone in their bodies. Hormones are neither female nor male in nature. The degree to which hormone levels, and testosterone-driven puberty, grant competitive advantage has been grossly overstated. Research shows that one’s testosterone levels do not predict superior athletic ability, and to state that one element in the body is the sole contributor to athlete success is untrue. Focusing mainly on biology and hormones overlooks the importance of natural talent, hard work, and access to training resources. Think about it: Tennis star Serena Williams could beat most people who’ve gone through a testosterone-driven puberty. This mentality overlooks the sheer talent and hard work that cisgender women put in to excel at their sport.
There are also some sports, including swimming and long-distance running, where cisgender women have a proven advantage over cisgender men. The reality is that there are many factors that contribute to athletic advantage, ranging from biology to sociology.
Exclusion of trans women harms all women, especially cisgender women of color
The hysteria around trans women participating in sports doesn’t just affect trans people it impacts everyone, especially cisgender women and women of color. Gender identity falls along a spectrum—not a binary—and so there’s no one way to define what makes someone a woman. It can be complicated and subjective. So when sports regulators have tried to impose gender testing and verification methods for elite athletes, the result has always led to a rise in the surveillance and policing of women’s bodies, largely carried out by cisgender men. You never see such testing efforts being enforced for men, it’s only ever women. There’s an extremely troubling history of “gender verification exams,” including genital checks of athletes on the women’s side, dating back to the early 20th century. Today, we have seen a resurgence of such archaic and invasive practices being proposed for children and youth. In 2022, politicians in Ohio tried to push for a law that would require genital checks for student athletes suspected to be trans. Though that proposal failed to gain traction, a similar proposal for high school students in Florida is being pursued as of this year.
The idea that women’s sports need saving only reinforces harmful stereotypes that women are weak and helpless. The efforts behind banning trans women from sports in the name of protecting women’s sports makes sports less safe for all.
Separate categories for trans and non-binary athletes are not the answer
Some sports regulators and policymakers around the world have suggested that trans and non-binary athletes could just play in their own separate category, what’s often referred to as an “open category.” On the surface, this might seem like a solution that everyone can get on board with as a way to resolve the tense debates around this topic. However, this would only lead to further discrimination and alienation of gender diverse athletes. We already know there’s a massive discrepancy between men’s and women’s sports when it comes to funding and resources. That discrepancy would be far worse for athletes in this open category. What’s more, trans athletes for the most part are not advocating for a third category like this to be the ultimate solution for all sports.
In 2023, the world governing body for swimming, World Aquatics, launched an open category for the Swimming World Cup in Berlin in response to swimmer Lia Thomas’ NCAA championship title. Exactly zero athletes signed up for this and the category was canceled. If trans people really wanted to participate in the sport just for a medal, wouldn’t it have made sense for at least one of them to enrol in this category to, in all likelihood, win quite easily? At the end of the day most trans people do not want to be seen as “other.” They want to be seen as themselves, and that means participating with athletes who align with their gender identity.
Voices is dedicated to featuring a wide range of inspiring personal stories and impactful opinions from the LGBTQ+ community and its allies. Visit Advocate.com/submit to learn more about submission guidelines. Views expressed in Voices stories are those of the guest writers, columnists, and editors, and do not directly represent the views of The Advocate or our parent company, equalpride.
I’ve been celebrating Pride since 1993 when I came out of the closet and embraced my truth as a queer human being. Back in the 90s, the groups that marched in the parades were largely community organizations and local businesses that directly supported LGBTQ+ people. However, for the past decade or so, Pride Month has become an opportunistic season in corporate America: rebranded rainbow logos, capsule merch collections, and hashtags full of supportive intentions. As a gay man and the CEO of a clothing company that serves the queer community year-round, I watched this shift with both cautious optimism and a wary eye. On one hand, visibility matters. On the other hand, commodification does not amount to liberation.
But this year feels different.
Some of the same companies that once proudly displayed the Pride flag now seem to have folded it up and relegated it to the back of the closet. Citing security concerns for their employees and changing consumer sentiments, many of our “corporate allies” have turned their backs on our community. When our representation depends on a quarterly risk report to shareholders, we must recognize that we are line items in their marketing budgets, not living, breathing human beings deserving of dignity, visibility, and respect.
So let’s be clear: Pride was never designed to be a marketing event, nor did it start out as a party. Pride was born out of protest. In 1969, queer people — many of them trans women of color — stood up to the indignity of police raids in gay spaces like the Stonewall Inn. Filled with fury and an unshakable conviction that they too deserved life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, our queer ancestors fought back against society’s oppression. Their actions are not just historical facts, they are the foundation upon which modern Pride celebrations and our rights as equal citizens are built.
After over 50 years of incremental progress, the pendulum seems to be swinging back against us. As a community, we are watching attempts to erase us happen in real time, from regressive legislative initiatives to misguided culture wars to scaled-back corporate campaigns. Businesses are showing us that they are willing to turn their backs on us as soon as we become inconvenient.
So now, more than ever, we need to have each other’s backs.
Those of us in the queer community and our true allies understand that visibility is not a seasonal campaign. It doesn’t just happen in June. It is a daily act of courage to exist authentically in a world that too often tells us we should do no such thing. For us, Pride isn’t optional. It is rooted in our very survival. It is not defined by who sponsors it. Pride belongs to us.
We see Pride in the grassroots fundraising efforts to fill in the gaps where corporate and federal funding has dried up. We see Pride in the community-organized marches and dance parties that give queer people spaces to rejoice in their identity. And we see Pride in every individual who walks down the street, living their truth, even when it might feel unsafe to do so.
So yes, Pride might look different this year. Shelves may not be filled with rainbow-adorned t-shirts and tablecloths. The hashtags may be fewer. The corporations may be quieter. But we will not be quiet. Our joy, our resilience, our solidarity—none of that is for sale. And none of it can be erased by the absence of rainbow paint jobs in June.
To our allies: Thank you for not turning your backs on us in the face of enormous pressure. You show up not just with words, but with actions. Your support of queer-owned businesses, your willingness to speak out against anti-LGBTQ+ policies, and your desire to educate yourself and others is the definition of real allyship.
To my fellow LGBTQ+ people: Our existence is not up for negotiation. Our identities are not marketing trends. We are more visible and more powerful than ever.
We are still here. We are still queer. And we are not going anywhere.
David Lauterstein is the CEO and co-owner of Nasty Pig, an NYC-based queer brand that has served the LGBTQ+ community for over 30 years.
Voices is dedicated to featuring a wide range of inspiring personal stories and impactful opinions from the LGBTQ+ community and its allies. Visit Advocate.com/submit to learn more about submission guidelines. Views expressed in Voices stories are those of the guest writers, columnists, and editors, and do not directly represent the views of The Advocate or our parent company, equalpride.
The second Grand Slam event on the 2025 tennis calendar, the French Open, or Roland Garros, got underway in Paris on Sunday (25 May), and there are several gay tennis players offering some vital rainbow LGBTQ+ representation.
Since the days of trailblazing gay Grand Slam champions Billie Jean King and Martina Navratilova, women’s tennis has long provided some of the biggest LGBTQ+ names in sport – and there are currently several players Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) tour carrying that torch for a new generation.
The men’s Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) tour continues to lag way behind the women’s game: Until last year, there were no out gay male players on tour, nor had there been since the Open era began in 1968.
Brazil’s João Lucas Reis da Silva came out publicly in December 2024. (Getty)
Prior to that, American former world number 57 Brian Vahaly had come out publicly as gay in 2017, a decade after retiring from the sport, and shed light on some of the barriers faced by gay male players.
“I heard homophobic comments all the time in the locker room – to my face, behind my back. That was just a part of the culture”, he told The Telegraph in 2018.
American former world number 57 Brian Vahaly came out publicly as gay in 2017, a decade after retiring from tennis. (Matthew Stockman/Getty)
While João Lucas Reis da Silva is not currently ranked high enough to qualify for direct entry to Grand Slam tournaments, here are the out gay female tennis players to keep an eye out for in the Australian Open 2025 main draw.
Out gay tennis players playing at the Australian Open 2025
Daria Kasatkina
Russia’s Daria Kasatkina says she’s unable to return home as a gay person who opposes the invasion of Ukraine. (Robert Prange/Getty Images)
Russian native Daria Kasatkina became the highest-profile out gay tennis star on the WTA tour when she came out publicly in July 2022 – a move that eventually led her to switch allegiance to Australia in March 2025.
“For me, being openly gay, if I want to be myself, I have to make this step, and I did it,” Kasatkina said of her decision to represent Australia in competition.
The tennis player, who has a career-high ranking of number eight and reached the quarter-finals at Wimbledon in 2018, confirmed her relationship with Olympic figure skater Natalia Zabiiako via Instagram when she originally came out.
In the years since, Kasatkina has been an outspoken critic of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and anti-gay political culture – even if it’s come at great personal cost.
“It’s unsafe for me now, with the regime we have. As a gay person who opposes the war, it’s not possible to go back,” she told The Times in July 2023. “But I don’t regret it even 1 per cent.”
She went on: “When the war started and everything turned to hell, I felt very overwhelmed and I just decided, “F*** it all”. I couldn’t hide any more. I wanted to say my position on the war and my [sexuality], which was tough, coming from a country where being gay is not accepted, but it felt like I had a backpack of stones on my shoulders and I just had to throw it off.
“Afterwards, I faced a few consequences, but the only thing that worried me was my parents, and they were fine. They are proud of me.”
Greet Minnen
Belgium’s Greet Minnen was in a high-profile relationship with fellow player Alison Van Uytvanck until 2021. (Benoit Doppagne/Getty )
Greet Minnen, who has a career-high ranking of 59, was in a high-profile relationship with fellow Belgian tennis star Alison Van Uytvanck until late 2021.
In 2019, Minnen and Van Uytvanck became the first same-sex couple in history to play doubles together at Wimbledon, reaching the second round.
Minnen’s public coming out took place at the tournament the year before, when Van Uytvanck rushed over to kiss her in the stands after defeating then-defending champion Garbiñe Muguruza in the second round.
Minnen and Van Uytvanck announced their engagement in December 2020 before going their separate ways the following year.
Demi Schuurs
Dutch player Demi Schuurs is a doubles specialist and out gay woman. (Matthew Stockman/Getty)
Dutch doubles specialist Demi Schuurs previously reached the semi-finals of the Australian Open as well as the quarter-finals of Wimbledon and the US Open in doubles.
Schuurs came out as gay as a teenager and has stated her desire to be a role model for young LGBTQ+ people.
She told the WTA in 2020: “I think that’s really nice to be able to support younger fans who may be going through the same things I did. I remember the feelings I had when I came out, so I want to help younger people understand that they should be how they want to be, and show what they want to show.
“You only live once, so you have to be happy and don’t need to stress about being gay or not.
Other gay tennis players on the WTA tour
Nadia Podoroska
Former French Open semi-finalist Nadia Podoroska came out publicly in October 2022. (Tim Clayton/Getty)
Argentinian tennis player Nadia Podoroska came out publicly in October 2022.
In an Instagram post, the former French Open semi-finalist – who has been ranked as high as number 36 in the world – confirmed her relationship with fellow Argentinian tennis player Guillermina Naya.
Shared on Naya’s 26th birthday, Podoroska’s post consisted of images of the couple hugging and kissing, with the caption: “Today I celebrate you from afar, but I feel you by my side every day of my life.”
Podoroska was congratulated on her announcement by former women’s world number one and LGBTQ+ trailblazer Billie Jean King, who tweeted: “Living authentically takes such courage, but is always worth it.”
Guillermina Naya
Argentina’s Guillermina Naya achieved a career-high ranking of 533 in 2020 and has won two titles on the ITF Cicuit – the tier of tournaments below the WTA tour.
Naya’s relationship with Argentinian player Nadia Podoroska was confirmed by Podoroska in October 2022.
Emina Bektas
American Emina Bektas is currently in a relationship with British player Tara Moore.
Bektas only broke into the world’s top 100 for the first time in 2023, becoming the fourth oldest top 100 debutant in WTA history.
Tara Moore
Out gay British player Tara Moore is a former world 145 player in singles and former top 100 player in doubles.
Moore is currently in a relationship with American player and former doubles partner Emina Bektas. She was previously engaged to Swiss player Conny Perrin.
Conny Perrin
Switzerland’s Conny Perrin has a career-high ranking of 134. (Justin Setterfield/Getty)
Swiss player Conny Perrin has been ranked as high as 134 in the world and was previously engaged to British player Tara Moore.
In 2017, Perrin told the New York Times that dating a fellow tennis player had benefits, saying: “It’s different when you date someone else who doesn’t really understand tennis and all the traveling and stuff like that.
“We understand that of course we need to travel sometimes apart.”
President Donald Trump threatened to withhold federal funding if California did not stop a transgender girl in high school from competing in state track and field finals, and said he would discuss it with Governor Gavin Newsom on Tuesday.
Trump, in a social media post, appeared to be referring to AB Hernandez, 16, who has qualified to compete in the long jump, high jump and triple jump championship run by the California Interscholastic Federation at a high school in Clovis, California, this weekend.
The CIF is the governing body for California high school sports, and its bylaws state that all students “should have the opportunity to participate in CIF activities in a manner that is consistent with their gender identity.” California law prohibits discrimination, including at schools, based on gender identity.
Trump, a Republican, referred in his social media post on Tuesday to California’s governor as a “Radical Left Democrat” and said: “THIS IS NOT FAIR, AND TOTALLY DEMEANING TO WOMEN AND GIRLS.”
He said he was ordering local authorities not to allow the trans athlete to compete in the finals.
Under the U.S. and California constitutions, state and local officials and individuals are not subject to orders of the president, who can generally only issue orders to agencies and members of the federal government’s executive branch.
Trump threatened that “large scale Federal Funding will be held back, maybe permanently,” if his demands are not met. Such a move would almost certainly lead to a legal challenge by California, which has already sued over multiple Trump actions it says are illegal or unconstitutional.
Trump also referred to comments Newsom made on his podcast in March when the governor also said he believed competition involving transgender girls was “deeply unfair.”
A spokesperson for Newsom declined to comment on Trump’s remarks, but referred to comments Newsom made in April when he said overturning California’s 12-year-old law allowing trans athletes to participate in sports was not a priority.
“You’re talking about a very small number of people,” Newsom told reporters. Out of the 5.8 million students in California’s public school system, there are estimated to be fewer than 10 active trans student athletes, according to the governor’s office.
A CIF spokesperson did not respond to questions, and Hernandez could not be immediately reached for comment.
Some local school officials and parents have sought to prevent Hernandez from competing; others have spoken in support of Hernandez and condemned what they say is bullying of a teenager.
In an interview with Capital & Main, Hernandez dismissed claims she has an unfair biological advantage in sports, noting that while she had placed first in a triple jump event this month, she came in eighth in the high jump and third in the long jump.
“All I thought was, I don’t think you understand that this puts your idiotic claims to trash,” Hernandez said of her mixed showing.
In a statement shared on X Tuesday afternoon, several hours after Trump’s social media post about California student athletics, the CIF announced it would be piloting a new “entry process” for this weekend’s track and field championships that will allow more cisgender, or nontransgender, female athletes to compete.
“Any biological female student-athlete who would have earned the next qualifying mark for one of their Section’s automatic qualifying entries in the CIF State meet, and did not achieve the CIF State at-large mark in the finals at their Section meet, was extended an opportunity to participate in the 2025 CIF State Track and Field Championships,” the statement said, in part.
The statement did not specify whether the new process would only apply to events for which Hernandez qualified.
When the Supreme Court issued its 88-page long judgement that the legal definition of ‘sex’ is based on ‘biology’, gender critical lobbying group and controversially registered charity LGB Alliance declared it was a “landmark for lesbian rights in the UK”.
“This matters greatly to LGB people,” CEO Kate Barker said of the ruling. “It is especially important to lesbians, because the definition of lesbian is directly linked to the definition of woman.”
Barker – who once claimed a singular drag queen carrying the Olympic torch demonstrated the “erasure of woman in all spheres of public life” – went on to say the ruling “marks a watershed for women and, in particular, lesbians who have seen their rights and identities undermined over the last decade”.
Despite Supreme Court judge Lord Hodge specifically counseling against certain factions “reading this judgement as a triumph of one or more groups in our society at the expense of another,” gender critical activists view the outcome of the Supreme Court case as a decisive victory for all women over so-called ‘gender ideology’.
However, in the days and weeks that have followed the Supreme Court ruling, it has quickly become clear that many women who are not trans – who are in the court’s definition born as ‘biological women’, identify as women and women and live their lives as women – will likely be disadvantaged by the court’s decision because they do not fit into narrow, often white and western, definitions of what constitutes as ‘woman’.
Transgender people and their allies stage a protest march in Westminster in support of trans rights following this week’s UK Supreme Court unanimous ruling that the terms woman and sex in the Equality Act 2010 refer to a biological woman and biological sex, in London, United Kingdom on April 19, 2025. (Wiktor Szymanowicz/Future Publishing via Getty Images)
Sparked by a trans-inclusive definition of womanhood in Gender Representation on Public Boards (Scotland) Act 2018 – which sought to diversity the number of women on public boards in the devolved nation – the Supreme Court decisionwas the culmination of a years-long legal battle between gender critical Scottish group For Women Scotland (FWS) and the Scottish government about how the protected characteristic of ‘sex’ is defined and applied in the 2010 Equality Act.
After traversing many different appeal processes, the case finally ended at the UK’s highest court and concluded the definition does not include trans people.
“The unanimous decision of this court is that the terms woman and sex in the Equality Act 2010 refer to a biological woman and biological sex,” Lord Hodge said in his oral reading of the ruling.
The decision is expected to have wide-ranging implications for the trans community, as well as organisations, public bodies and services who may be forced to update their policies on single-sex spaces, inclusion and discrimination. Some, including the Football Association and the England and Wales Cricket Board, have already taken steps to bar trans women from taking part in female matches.
In the wake of the ruling, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) – the UK’s equalities watchdog – issued interim guidance which said single-sex spaces must be based on biology whereby a trans woman must not be allowed to use a female toilet and a trans man not allowed to use a male one. However, the guidance also adds that, in “some circumstances,” trans women should also be banned from the men’s facilities and trans men from women’s facilities.
When asked to clarify this point by the BBC, the EHRC directed the broadcaster to a section of the Supreme Court ruling which states trans men could be excluded from women’s facilities “where reasonable objection is taken to their presence, for example because the gender reassignment process has given them a masculine appearance or attributes to which reasonable objection might be taken” in the context of a female-only space, such as a toilet.
In essence, when a trans man looks, well, too much like a man (because he is one) or when a trans woman looks, well, too much like a woman (because she is one), they can be totally excluded from gendered spaces and be forced to only use a unisex facility – assuming one is available.
If the circumstances which would see trans men – who are defined by the court ruling as ‘biologically female’ – banned from female toilets is all about ‘masculine appearance’, then where does this leave masculine, cis women?
Whilst the Supreme Court case is supposedly about ‘protecting’ the interests of all women, this exception – in itself – shows there is only interest in protecting certain kinds of women. Namely, women who ‘look’ like women: traditionally feminine women with long hair, hips and visible breasts, who dress and talk and walk in a way that is ‘expected’ of women and who have no trouble moving through the world as one.
By contrast, there are plenty of other women out there who constantly have their gender and presentation policed by strangers for not fitting into the narrow and misogynistic definitions of what a woman should be. Women who are tall, have short hair, broad shoulders and square jawlines. Women who wear clothes from the men’s section and have deep voices and body hair. Women who are “incorrectly female,” Hannah Gadsby famously said.
Writing for Refinery29 in 2022, Yassine Senghor exemplifies this as “a dark-skinned Black, fat, masculine-presenting dyke with a shaved head who tends to lean towards clothing gendered as men’s” and said she has always been told she is “doing ‘woman’ wrong”. Similarly, in a different article for the publication, architect Martha said she has been made to feel that she is “failing at womanhood” and even when she presented more femininely was questioned about her gender.
Such slim definitions of what is correct or incorrect womanhood rooted in patriarchal beauty standards are – ironically enough – what feminists have actually spent decades fighting against, so that women have the choice about whether or not they want to shave their legs, wear make-up or put on dresses or *gasp* trousers.
The Supreme Court ruling will, very likely, cause butch and masculine lesbians to face increased harassment in single-sex female spaces simply because of how they present themselves. This is not a fictitious, dystopian musing by one dyke about the rights of others in her community, this is something we have already seen – and are continuing to see – when it comes to women do not fit into the confindes of traditional femininity and gender.
For Lesbian Visibility Week, which came a week after the Supreme Court’s decision, Labour MP Kate Osborne said she is “frequently misgendered”because of how she looks and expressed concern it will only get worse going forward.
“I note that Ministers said yesterday that there will be guidance regarding the Supreme Court verdict. That decision will have a huge impact on my life, on many other cis lesbians and, indeed, on heterosexual women,” Osborne told fellow MPs. “I suspect that I will get challenged even more now when accessing facilities. The impact on my life will be problematic, but the impact on my trans siblings’ lives will be significantly worse.”
Just this week, across the pond, in the United States, a number of headlines were dedicated to an incident involving lesbian woman Ansley Baker who was removed from a female toilet in a Boston hotel by a male security guard after being accused of being ‘a man’ by other women in the facility. The irony that it was a male security guard who banged on the cubical door and removed her when her shorts were not fully done up has not been lost on most in the LGBTQ+ community, it must be noted.
Baker is certainly not the first, nor will she likely be the last, lesbian to face such treatment, with other incidents from recent years including the partner of children’s author Jessica Walton and poet Eloise Stonborough, whilst Martha told R29 she has “some kind of confrontation or experience in a public bathroom every few months” after starting to present in a more butch way.
But, tight confines and strict parameters of what constitutes correct womanliness and the social punishments inflicted when broken are not solely restricted to masculine lesbians, straight women too have subject to such policing.
In 2023, the pregnant girlfriend of Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel actor Erin Darke, was transvestigated by anti-trans pundits on social media because she happens to be taller than Radcliffe and have certain facial features. Transvesigation refers to conspiracy theories that falsely claim individuals, typically women, are transgender and are hiding their “true” gender identity, with Drake accused of ‘secretly being trans’. Transvesitigations are entirely rooted in warped, deeply misogynistic and racist, views of femininity and gender.
Similarly, Olympic boxer Imane Khelif – who was thrust into the centre of a gender storm during the Paris Games – was accused of ‘being a man’ despite the fact she, and Olympic bosses, clarified she is not nor has ever identified as trans. In fact in Algeria, where Khelif hails from, gender-affirming care is banned and public gender non-conformity has the potential to be prosecuted as “indecent” under the 1966 penal code. However, people failed to engage the grey matter in their brains and the conspiracy persisted because, according to the wisdom of users on X/Twitter, Khelif has a strong nose, muscles, is tall and has hairs on her knuckles, so must be male.
Other cis women who are seemingly not woman enough according to transphobes include rugby icon Ilona Maher, tennis legend Serena Williams and former first lady Michelle Obama. Why? Again, because their bodies have dared to exist outside of patriarchal beauty standards, defined and controlled by the the male gaze.
As organisations, public bodies and services across the UK look set to draw up fresh guidelines in response to the Supreme Court ruling we will all do well to remember that gender policing does far, far more harm than ever does any good. At best it can be an irritant for women who move through the world everyday in a more masculine presentation, at its worst it poses an inherent threat to the people such an ill-thought out ruling is supposed to protect; putting woman who do not conform at risk of harassment, abuse and vigliante justice.
As Hannah Gadsby explained when she described herself as being ‘incorrectly female’, she was beaten up for being visibly lesbian and accepted that was what she was worth, because that is what the world told her.
“He beat the shit out of me and nobody stopped him. And I didn’t report that to the police and I did not take myself to the hospital and I should have. And you know why I didn’t? Because I thought that is all I was worth,” she explained during her stand up show Nanette. “And that was not homophobia pure and simple, people, that was gendered. If I’d have been feminine, that would not have happened. I am incorrectly female, I am incorrect, and that is a punishable offence.”
At its heart gender policing just proves – just like their views on the beautiful diversity of gender are narrow – the views of bigots on womanhood are equally as restrictive.
Like most Americans, I love visiting old places, whether Savannah, Seattle, or Santa Fe. I love historic architecture, gardens, and sacred sites. I like nothing better than hearing music in an old church, eating at a legacy restaurant, or staying at an old Airbnb.
But until a few years ago, I didn’t see myself in the historic sites I toured—not in the grand mansions built by the robber barons in the 19th century from Newport to the Coast of California, nor even in the homes of the founding fathers, from George Washington to John Adams. Though I enjoyed visiting and learned a lot, it was as if the place had to be for fancy or rich people to be a place people cared to save.
In recent years, historic places have begun to tell more stories about the many people who lived and worked there. Those stories can help people see themselves in the place and feel that sense of belonging that is essential for our mental and emotional health and to recognize the connections between us.
The descendants of Italian immigrants see themselves in the stories told at New York’s Tenement Museum and how their experience was like that of Irish immigrants. Jewish people can see themselves in the historic Touro Synagogue in Newport, Rhode Island, and hear how religious freedom was equally essential to Baptists, Methodists, and Presbyterians. African-Americans can see themselves in the Sixth Avenue Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, and understand how civil rights impact everyone.
Lesbian, gay, bi, transgender, and queer people can see themselves at places that now tell these stories. From Iberia, Lousiana’s Shadows-on-the-Teche, which tells the story of not only of the plantation economy, but also of Weeks Hall and the creative society of straight and queer preservationists in Louisiana. The Pauli Murray House in Durham, North Carolina, tells the story of the lawyer, writer, and Episcopalian saint, Pauli Murray, who questioned her gender. These places tell stories that are layered and complex and include everyone in the history of America.
I’m deeply grateful we tell these stories. I wish these stories had been told when I was younger, because historic places do more than just educate visitors about the past. For many Americans, they are sources of profound personal meaning. But as the Trump Administration moves to erase stories about the fight for equality and equal representation, the stakes have never been higher.
Recently, the National Park Service removed references to transgender and queer people from the website for the Stonewall National Monument. This move completely negates the instrumental role of transgender and queer people who participated in the revolt that jump-started a more activist gay rights movement. This erasure not only prevents transgender and queer people from seeing themselves in our history, and knowing that they will be part of our future, it also erases the connections and complexity for everyone who cares about the progress of the United States toward a more perfect union.
This erasure can also be a matter of life and death for young people.
When I first consciously knew I was gay, my first thought was, Oh, that’s what I am. My second, and immediate, thought was, if anyone ever finds out, I will be killed. For over a decade after that, I was closeted. From time to time, I considered suicide. The rate of suicide among LGBTQ teens is four times the national average.
I wish I had heard and known the stories of LGBTQ+ people like Pauli Murray or Weeks Hall in the places I visited back then. The stories of these places may have given me a sense of belonging, of seeing myself in the world, and in this place we call the United States of America.
The same principle applies to all of us, regardless of who we love or what we look like. That’s why we must continue to tell these stories. They represent the history of our country’s quest to form a more perfect union and ensure that we live up to the ideals on which it was founded.
For 22-year-old Alex Ann, conversations about transgender women are black and white.
“Trans women are women,” said Ann, who identifies as a nonbinary trans person.
And when it comes to trans women competing in female sports — an issue that the Trump administration has made part of its policy agenda since Inauguration Day — Ann said that trans women should have all the same rights as cisgender women.
“When you are talking about what a woman is, well now you’re talking about checking to see if you’re really a woman,” said Ann, a South Florida resident. “And the kind of violation that in and of itself poses” goes too far, Ann continued.
Ann represents the views of just over a third of Gen Z, or 36%, that trans women should be allowed to participate in female sports, according to the new NBC News Stay Tuned Poll, powered by SurveyMonkey. That level of support, from respondents ages 18-29, was the highest of any generation in the poll of 19,682 American adults.
Overall, 1 in 4 respondents, or 25%, said they supported trans women participating in female sports in a yes/no question. The other 75% of American adults said they do not believe trans women should be permitted to participate in female sports.
Cecilia Pogue, a 21-year-old college student from Virginia, said she believes that allowing trans women to compete in female sports comes at the expense of cisgender women.
“We want people to feel comfortable in their skin,and we want them to have opportunities, but we also need to make sure we’re not taking opportunities away from the majority to please the minority,” Pogue said.
Many Gen Zers who spoke with NBC News about the topic discussed the complexity and nuances around it, such as how going through male puberty or taking hormone suppressants could affect a trans woman’s physical development.
“A lot could be fixed by having a separate column for trans sports,” said Julian Miller, 22, from Texas. “Just like how we separate male and females, we should separate trans males and trans females to compete against each other. I know there might not be a lot of competition at first, but as the sport grows, so will the competition.”
The poll found a significant gender gap between young men and women on the issue. About 3 in 4 Gen Z men (72%) say transgender women should not be allowed to play female sports, compared with about half of young women (56%).
Advocates of trans women competing in female sports say that the marginal number of trans women competing at an elite level makes the topic a nonissue. In December, NCAA President Charlie Baker testified that he was aware of fewer than 10 transgender athletes out of more than 500,000 total NCAA college student-athletes, which would equal 0.002% of this college student-athlete population.
“This is really a distraction,” Ann said. “It matters, but it’s not what is most important right now.”
Jay Baca, a 26-year-old who identifies as nonbinary, noted that when trans men compete in men’s sports “nobody bats an eye about it.”
“It still comes down to patriarchy, sexism and transphobia,” the Colorado native said.
But despite the criticism and the relatively low numbers of people involved, it has undeniably become a hot-button political issue in recent years.
Critics of trans women in female sports say trans women have an unfair advantage past puberty due to their body composition. Differences in body mass, bone density and height that trans women may have, Pogue said, can create a “dangerous” environment.
“I don’t really want to play soccer against a 6-[foot]-2 person who already went through puberty and then changed late high school or in early college,” she said.
Vito Milino, 22, of California, said trans women should not compete in “full-contact or highly physical sports alongside cisgender women” but sees no problem in other sports.
San Jose State University’s women’s volleyball program became a flashpoint in the national conversation over trans women and women’s sports recently, as has swimming, a noncontact sport. In 2022, Lia Thomas made history when she became the first openly trans woman to win an NCAA championship while competing for the University of Pennsylvania women’s swim team. Thomas had spent the first two years of her collegiate career on Penn’s men’s team.
The NCAA in February changed its rules following an executive order from President Donald Trump, with the collegiate athletics organization instituting a new policy that “limits competition in women’s sports to student-athletes assigned female at birth only.”
Then, on Monday, the Trump administration said that Penn violated laws that guaranteed equal protections for women in sports by allowing a trans swimmer to compete on the school’s women’s team and into team facilities. The Education Department previously announced an investigation of San Jose State.
Still, some medical experts caution against misconceptions that fuel much of the dialogue around trans women in female sports.
“Trans women are people who want to participate in society as the gender they identify as being — women,” said Bradley Anawalt, an endocrinologist and professor of medicine at the University of Washington School of Medicine, who rejects the notion that trans women are changing for athletic advantages.
“They are not undergoing gender-affirming hormone therapy to attempt to have greater success in sports,” he said. “Gender-affirming therapy, hormone therapy is not easy. It requires doctor visits, blood tests and frequent doses of medications that might include shots.”
When it comes to body composition, he added, “The competitive advantage of elite male athletes starts with puberty when blood testosterone concentrations increase to adult male levels.”
Alithia Zamantakis, an assistant professor at Northwestern University’s Institute for Sexual and Gender Minority Health and Wellbeing, sees the higher Gen Z poll numbers in support of trans women competing in female sports as compared with older demographics as an indicator of a shift in “society at large.”
“We can expect greater and greater support for transgender rights as the myths and anti-trans” rhetoric are demystified, she said.
Missing from the conversation is a “balancing of equities,” according to Lanae Erickson, senior vice president for social policy, education and politics at Third Way, a Democratic-aligned Washington, D.C., think tank.
“Sports are fabulous ways to learn all kinds of values — teamwork, persistence and healthy habits,” she said. “And just saying that an entire class of people can’t participate in any sport at any level, it really goes against those values and is a real detriment to that group of people.”
“We also do need rules about participation in sports,” Erickson added.
“But I think those rules should be made based on fairness and safety, not based on animus towards a certain group of people,” she continued.
This NBC News Stay Tuned poll was powered by SurveyMonkey, the fast, intuitive feedback management platform where 20 million questions are answered daily. It was conducted online April 11-20 among a national sample of 19,682 adults ages 18 and over. Reported percentages exclude item nonresponse and round to the nearest percentage point. The estimated margin of error for this survey among all adults is plus or minus 2.2 percentage points.
Central to heteronormativity is a presupposition that people are “naturally” cisgender and heterosexual, and that values, laws, and institutions should be organized accordingly. Within this framework, gender and sexual nonconformity are framed as medical or psychological disorders and immoral perversions of religious teachings. Power structures are organized in ways that favor people who identify as cisgender and heterosexual (especially men) and marginalize people who identify with differing sexual and/or gender categories, or who otherwise fall outside of heteronormative standards.
Perhaps the most impressive feat of heteronormativity is its clever obfuscation of the fact that it, in and of itself, is a gender ideology, a set of social norms that requires continuous buy-in and cultural maintenance. Instead of owning this reality, people enforce heteronormativity by enmeshing its core assertions into what they feel are “irrefutable truths” about God and nature.
As part of a series of executive orders that have attempted to impose a Christian nationalist agenda, President Donald Trump declared: “It is the policy of the United States to recognize two sexes, male and female. These sexes are not changeable and are grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality.”
A quintessential example of heteronormativity, describing a binary sex as “incontrovertible reality” is a rhetorical device that ignores intersex people and fails to capture the complex cultural variations of gender. Phrases like this are frequently weaponized against the lived experiences of trans individuals and add force to policies that prohibit trans civil and legal protections. Simply put, the purpose of this executive order is to delegitimize and ultimately erase trans and gender nonconforming individuals from US society.
Wielding power through policing gender
Policing the boundaries of gender identity and punishing the expression of gender nonconformity is a hallmark of authoritarian governments. This is likely because control over such a personal and intimate aspect of one’s life allows for the wielding of greater political and structural power. A prime example of this is Nazi Germany, where Hitler and his followers constructed rigid gender norms and classification schemes that framed homosexuality and gender variance (particularly among men) as pathological and destructive to society. Tens of thousands of homosexual men and a small number of homosexual women were sent to concentration camps as part of the Holocaust’s broader antisemitic aims.
A more recent example is Russia, which, under the authoritarian control of Vladimir Putin, fosters an atmosphere of fear and oppression for its LGBTQ+ people. In addition to fostering a strongly negative public opinion about same-sex relationships and gender transitions, Russia provides no LGBTQ+ legal protections or laws against anti-LGBTQ+ hate crimes, and it prohibits legal name changes and gender-transitioning care for trans people. In 2023, its Supreme Court designated the “international LGBT movement” as “extremist,” which has only exacerbated persecution and hate crimes against sexual and gender minorities.
Many conservative religions also authoritatively police the boundaries of sexual/gender identity and expression. Among other right-leaning US faiths, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) frames same-sex relations and gender transitions as sinful and oppositional to divine teachings. While its rhetoric about LGBTQ+ people has softened significantly in the past half-century, its current policies exclude people in same-sex relationships and those who have undergone a physical and/or social gender transition from central ecclesiastical privileges.
These privileges include access to temple worship, participation in priesthood rituals, and appointment to leadership opportunities. In the Summer of 2024, LDS authorities implemented a more stringent crackdown on trans members, mandating specific bathroom usage, requiring trans individuals to attend gender-specific meetings according to their assigned biological sex, and barring trans adults from serving as teachers or working with children.
These types of policies reflect the persistent fearmongering common in today’s MAGA politics, which deceptively frames trans individuals as perpetrators of violence, particularly against children. In actuality, LGBTQ+ individuals, particularly youth, are victims of sexual violence far more often than the general population, and cisgender men commit sexual violence more frequently than all sexual and gender minority demographics combined. Donald Trump, himself convicted of sexual abuse, exemplifies this irony – he routinely disparages trans people and frames them as sexually predatory, when he himself has a long history of predatory behavior.
The logical and ethical problems of legally enforcing a gender binary
If a cisgender binary truly were an “incontrovertible reality,” why then would it need to be enforced legally? This question exposes an inconvenient paradox that right-wing political and religious regimes seek to avoid. They rely on biological and religious claims of innate gender differences while contradictorily asserting the perpetual need to enforce the social and legal boundaries of gender expression.
Trump’s executive order and religiopolitical sentiments like it portray gender as both biologically immutable and a shifting product of sociocultural and legal standards. You simply cannot have it both ways. As associate professor of religion at Kalamazoo College, Taylor Petrey, points out, “If biology was immutable, it wouldn’t need to be enforced.”
The very need to create laws and policies that assert a cisgender worldview reveals how fragile heteronormativity really is. After all, the presence and visibility of more diverse gender identities and expressions by no means threatens the legitimacy of long-existing cisgender and heterosexual identities. Categorically speaking, trans and gender nonconforming individuals pose no dangers to society and deserve a full measure of dignity and equality.
Nevertheless, Donald Trump’s policies are emblematic of white, cisgender, heterosexual campaigns in the US that seek to preserve political power and privilege at all costs. And the anger and hatred that the MAGA movement expresses toward gender nonconformity is a symptom of deep fear and insecurity regarding increased equity and inclusion for people different from them.
That is exactly why the Trump administration has obliterated Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs and initiatives. It is also why conspiracy theories describing school children being indoctrinated into trans identities and gender-affirming surgery are so widespread. Conspiracies are born out offear andfragility, not out of compassion and clarity. Thus, Trump’s legislation that negates important legal protections for and attacks the legitimacy of gender minorities is not about promoting harmony and well-being in society, but about the preservation of power and a specific type of extremist political and religious identity.
During a press conference on April 22, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison announced his filing of a federal lawsuit against the Trump administration and the Department of Justice (DOJ). The suit challenges the president’s anti-trans executive order directing agencies to withhold federal funding from educational programs that allow transgender girls to compete on women’s sports teams, under the claim that it violates both constitutional rights and Title IX of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
The order in question, signed February 5, attempts to bar trans students from competing on school sports teams matching their gender identity, by revoking federal funding from public schools that don’t comply.
However, the MHRA prohibits discrimination based on protected classes like sexual orientation and gender identity—a clear conflict of interest.
But the DOJ responded by sending a letter five days later threatening to sue Minnesota if the state did not comply. The department continued to threaten the state in an April 8 letter and, and in an April 16 press conference, the DOJ stated it would seek “judicial resolution” and withhold funds from Minnesota if they refused compliance.
Recently, Ellison called their bluff and took the first shot, announcing that Minnesota would sue the DOJ and the president in his official capacity on four legal claims.
“I’m not gonna sit around waiting for the Trump administration to sue Minnesota,” Ellison said during the press conference. “Today, Minnesota is suing him and his administration because we will not participate in this shameful bullying—we will not let a small group of vulnerable children who are only trying to be healthy and live their lives be demonized, many of their parents are here today, and I thank them for their presence. The bottom line is: In our Minnesota, everyone is included in the circle of our compassion, and no one is out of our circle of protection.”
Sometimes countries face a moment like this—faced with a leader bent on destroying entire communities and instilling fear in those who protect them.Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison
The four main legal claims state that Trump’s order is invalid because the administration is trying to use the powers that the Constitution reserves to Congress.
The second claim argues that the order violates Title IX, a common argument the Trump administration uses to enforce the order. However, this interpretation is highly contested, and attempts by the Trump administration to redefine it to fit their interpretation have been blocked by courts.
The third claim states that the order violates the Administrative Procedures Act which requires courts to “set aside agency action” that is “arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with law.” The fourth and final argument—and one of the more serious accusations—is that the order violates the 10th Amendment by trying to override a state law despite the amendment giving states the right to self govern.
This lawsuit is yet another in a series of lawsuits Minnesota has brought against the Trump administration.
One notable case from early February saw Minnesota joining with three other states to sue the Trump administration for an executive order threatening to cut federal grants to hospitals that provide gender-affirming treatment to individuals under 19. The plaintiffs argued that the order violated their 10th Amendment rights, and a federal judge ruled that Trump’s order could not be enforced in four plaintiff states.
The recently filed lawsuit also echoes a similar situation with Maine, whose leaders have refused to follow the anti-trans sports ban, and have since been hit by federal agencies withholding funding to the state.
“Sometimes countries face a moment like this—faced with a leader bent on destroying entire communities and instilling fear in those who protect them,” Ellison said in the press conference. “The lessons of history tell us a leader like that doesn’t stop at one community—after he’s destroyed one, he goes after another, and another, and another.”
