As part of an agreement with the federal government, the University of Pennsylvania will exclude transgender athletes from female sports teams and erase swimmer Lia Thomas’s records, according to the Department of Education.
The agreement is part of the Trump administration’s broader restrictions on transgender people, as it expands its efforts to prohibit transgender athletes from competing in women’s sports across the country and serving in the military.
Thomas, a University of Pennsylvania graduate, won the 2022 NCAA championship in the women’s 500-yard freestyle. Thomas is a transgender woman.
“Penn has always followed—and continues to follow—Title IX and the applicable policy of the NCAA regarding transgender athletes,” UPenn President J. Larry Jameson said in a news release Tuesday.
In response to Trump’s executive order, the NCAA announced a change to its transgender athlete policy that would limit transgender participation in women’s sports.
In March, the White House cut off $175 million in federal funds for Penn due to the transgender athlete issue. It’s unclear whether the money will be restored.
“Penn will continue to follow these new rules,” Jameson added.
Thomas’ records have been removed from the University of Pennsylvania’s list of all-time school records in women’s swimming. A note at the bottom of the document reads, “Competing under the eligibility rules in effect at the time, Lia Thomas set program records in the 100, 200, and 500 freestyle during the 2021-22 season.”
CNN has reached out to the NCAA for comment on the agreement.
The US Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights said in a statement Tuesday that an investigation found UPenn violated Title IX by “allowing males to compete in women’s intercollegiate athletics and occupy women-only intimate facilities.”
Title IX prohibits sex-based discrimination in any academic institution receiving federal funding.
“We will review and update the Penn women’s swimming records set during that season to indicate who would now hold the records under current eligibility guidelines,” according to Jameson.
UPenn also agreed to issue a statement stating that it “will adopt biology-based definitions for the words’male’ and ‘female’ pursuant to Title IX” and in accordance with President Donald Trump’s two executive orders on transgender athletes, according to the Department of Education.
The school will also apologize to female student-athletes who lost to Thomas during the 2021-2022 swimming season.
“We recognize this and will apologize to those who experienced a competitive disadvantage or experienced anxiety because of the policies in effect at the time,” according to Jameson.
Trump’s ban on female trans athletes
In February, Trump signed an executive order titled “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports” with the goal of banning transgender women from competing in women’s sports.
“With this executive order, the war on women’s sports is over,” the president declared during a signing ceremony attended by dozens of women and young girls dressed in athletic gear.
Some critics argue that transgender athletes have an unfair advantage in sports, but research contradicts this claim.
While research is limited and ongoing, a 2017 review in the peer-reviewed journal Sports Medicine discovered “no direct or consistent research” indicating that trans people have an athletic advantage.
A more recent October 2023 review of the research concluded that while sex differences develop after puberty, many are “reduced, if not erased, over time by gender affirming hormone therapy.”
Physical attributes that could benefit a trans girl, such as height or limb length, appear to be “less malleable,” according to the study, but it also noted that there are no efforts to limit cisgender athletes who are taller than average or physically gifted in any other way.
The executive order has two goals: to ensure compliance with Title IX, which prohibits gender discrimination in federally funded education programs or activities, and to increase federal engagement with the private sector.
Ahead of the signing, a White House official stated that the new action would contradict the Biden administration’s position on Title IX, which established a rule that schools violate Title IX by prohibiting transgender students from participating on sports teams.
According to the official, the Trump administration’s position on Title IX is that “if you’re going to have women’s sports, if you’re going to provide opportunities for women, then they have to be equally safe, equally fair, and equally private opportunities, and so that means that you’re going to preserve women’s sports for women.”
The debate on transgender athletes
Thomas became the first transgender athlete to win an NCAA Division I title in 2022, finishing first in the women’s 500-yard freestyle.
Thomas, a former swimmer for the men’s team at UPenn, has come to represent the ongoing debate over trans women’s participation in sports and the balance between inclusion and fair play.
Thomas previously told the SwimSwam podcast that she realized she was trans in the summer of 2018, but she kept it a secret for fear of losing her swimming ability.
“The very simple answer is that I’m not a man,” she explained to Sports Illustrated in March. “I’m a woman, so I should be on the women’s team. Transgender people deserve the same respect as all other athletes.”
In February, three former UPenn women’s swimming athletes sued the university, the Ivy League Council of Presidents, and athletics organizations, alleging that allowing Thomas to compete against them violated federal law.
Thomas has not responded publicly to the latest lawsuit. Despite her stated intention to continue swimming competitively after college, Thomas has been barred from international events under World Aquatics rules, which only qualify transgender athletes who have not reached biological puberty.
The Court of Arbitration for Sport rejected Thomas’ challenge to the rule, rendering her ineligible for most elite competitions, including the 2024 Olympics.
