On Wednesday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order banning transgender girls and women from participating in girls' and women's sports.
"We will not allow men to beat up, injure and cheat our women and our girls. From now on, women's sports will be only for women," Trump said at the signing ceremony, standing at a podium flanked by female athletes. "With this executive order, the war on women's sports is over."
In his speech, Trump emphasized the effect on K-12 schools and colleges and universities -- which receive federal student aid and federal funds through certain programs, such as free and reduced lunch and special education services -- and are subject to Title IX, the law designed to prevent gender discrimination in education.
"We are putting every school receiving taxpayer dollars on notice that if you let men take over women's sports teams or invade your locker rooms, you will be investigated for violations of Title IX and risk your federal funding. There will be no federal funding," he said.
Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin, who attended the signing ceremony, applauded the executive order.
"Girls deserve the opportunity to enjoy athletic competition without competing with biological men," Griffin told ESPN in a statement. "This executive order is an important step toward that goal, and I look forward to working with the Trump administration to ensure that our girls and women have every opportunity guaranteed to them under Title IX."
While Trump's comments and much of the discussion leading up to the signing Wednesday focused on athletes in schools, the executive order reached far beyond that scope, extending to sport governing bodies and associations, foreign athletes coming to the United States, and the International Olympic Committee.
Shiwali Patel, a senior director with the National Women's Law Center, which opposed the ban, said she "didn't expect that [the order] would be this sweeping in impact."
"It seems like they were throwing in anything they could to really broadly ensure that their attack reached every level of sport," she said. "It's using this broad civil rights law as a weapon and turning it on its head to require discrimination against an already vulnerable group of students."
ESPN reached out to the Independent Women's Forum, one of the groups advocating for the ban, for comment on the reach of the order and did not receive a response.
The executive order raises questions about which athletes and sporting organizations are impacted, as well as how the government will enforce its policy. Here's what we know.
Who is affected by this?
The number of transgender athletes competing in K-12 sports is unknown. But in multiple states that have debated this type of legislation, the numbers of known transgender girls competing in girls' sports have been in the single digits, sometimes just one, as was the case in Utah, Kentucky and Ohio.
At the NCAA level, president Charlie Baker said at a congressional hearing in December that fewer than 10 NCAA athletes used the association's transgender athlete eligibility policy. More than 530,000 athletes compete in the NCAA.
In response to the order, the NCAA on Wednesday said it would review the executive order and align its policy. "We strongly believe that clear, consistent, and uniform eligibility standards would best serve today's student-athletes instead of a patchwork of conflicting state laws and court decisions," the NCAA said in a statement. "To that end, President Trump's order provides a clear, national standard."
Additionally, the order directs White House officials to convene "representatives of major athletic organizations and governing bodies" to "promote" policies in line with its policy. These entities are not subject to Title IX.
Griffin, the Arkansas attorney general, said the order does not apply to privately owned sports leagues and clubs. "But I applaud President Trump for leading on this issue and sending a clear message to athletic leagues at all levels that the American people want fairness for girls and women in sports," he said.
Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares agreed that the order would not apply to athletes in programs that did not receive federal funding. He said an example of an association that would need to comply is the Virginia High School League, which is a private, non-profit organization whose members are public and private high schools.
The wide-ranging language in the executive order has left some private organizations wondering whether they must comply. Karen Kauffman, senior director of global programs with the Women's Flat Track Derby Association, said the association has welcomed transgender athletes. The association represents 412 leagues and 20,000 skaters worldwide, with 75% in the U.S. Teams are typically not associated with schools or colleges; the association does not receive federal funding; and roller derby is not part of the Olympic movement in the U.S., Kauffman said.
"It's hard for us to even grasp how this will impact us. It will be harmful to our sport. We have a progressive, open-gender policy that the government now disagrees with," Kauffman said. "What does this mean?"
Kauffman said the new rules restricting transgender athletes from foreign countries would have an impact. She said the uncertainty prompted the league at the end of last year to choose Sweden instead of the U.S. as the host country for its 2026 global championships.
"For now we operate as usual," she added. "We have to again see how this plays out legally."
The order also calls on the United Nations and International Olympic Committee to adopt policies in line with the order. It directs the Secretary of State and the Secretary of Homeland Security to work to prevent "males seeking to participate in women's sports" from entering the U.S. by using laws designed to deny visas to foreign visitors.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the executive order is part of a "very public pressure campaign" on the IOC and NCAA to "do the right thing for women and girls across the country."
At the signing ceremony, Trump said he would prevent transgender athletes from obtaining visas for the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles.
In response to questions about how the order would apply, the IOC issued a statement via email, stating, "Working with the respective International Sports Federations, the IOC will continue to explain and discuss the various topics with the relevant authorities." A spokesperson for the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee did not respond to requests Wednesday for comment.
How will it be enforced?
Enforcement of Title IX rests with the federal government, administered through the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights, which has the ability to investigate alleged violations and withhold federal funding. On Thursday, the Department of Education announced Title IX investigations into two universities and a high school athletic association where transgender athletes reportedly competed.
Twenty-five states already have legislation in place that bars transgender girls and women from girls' and women's sports. Those laws focus on K-12 and competitive, club and intramural collegiate sports at public schools and universities. Enforcement of those laws typically falls to individual schools and districts. Some states have put a process in place that enables a school to challenge a student's eligibility.
Miyares, the Virginia attorney general, said states can also investigate violations based on anti-discrimination laws, and cited an ongoing state-led investigation of Roanoke College, a private university where a transgender woman requested to switch from the men's swim team to the women's team, prompting opposition from current female swimmers. He said state-imposed consequences for violating the ban could "run the gamut from financial penalties to a consent decree where they agree to stop the discriminatory practices."
When referencing sport-specific governing bodies, the executive order calls upon state attorneys general to "identify best practices in defining and enforcing equal opportunities for women to participate in sports."
How states plan to enforce a ban against transgender athletes outside of a school setting, such as club sports or professional sports, remains to be seen.
In terms of enforcing restrictions against international athletes, the order directs two federal agencies -- the State Department and Homeland Security -- to manage that through the review of visa applications, "with an objective of preventing such entry to the extent permitted by law."
How did the controversy start?
Controversy surrounding transgender athletes in girls' and women's sports started to bubble in 2017 when Mack Beggs, a transgender boy, won his district girls' wrestling championship via forfeit, qualifying for the Texas state championship. Beggs would go on to win that championship and defended it the following season. That same year, Andraya Yearwood, a transgender girl in Connecticut, won a Class M state championship in girls' track and field.
Another transgender girl competed in Connecticut the following season. Combined, they won 15 state championships from 2018 to 2020. The Alliance Defending Freedom filed a complaint in the summer of 2019, arguing the state's high school association's inclusive policy violated Title IX. ADF then filed a federal lawsuit on Feb. 12, 2020, the same day Idaho state Rep. Barbara Ehardt introduced HB 500, which became the first law that barred transgender girls and women from girls' and women's sports in K-12 and collegiate sports. ADF consulted on the bill.
Eight additional states followed Idaho's lead and passed similar legislation in 2021. In December 2021, Lia Thomas, a transgender woman swimming on the Penn women's team, posted the top times in the country in the 200-yard and 500-yard freestyle. Thomas had previously swum three seasons on the men's team, including one while suppressing her testosterone. Her participation on the women's team -- she won an NCAA championship in 500 free -- brought national attention to the topic of transgender women competing in women's sports.
In 2023, under the Biden administration, the Department of Education released proposed rules that would have prohibited schools from adopting wholesale bans on transgender athletes from participating on teams that align with their gender identity but gave them some flexibility to restrict participation based on grade, sport and level of competition to ensure fairness and prevent sports-related injuries.
Transgender students in elementary school would generally be able to participate because sports at that level are focused on "building teamwork, fitness, and basic skills," the department said as an example. As students get older and the stakes get higher in high school and college, where issues of fairness in competition become more of a factor, schools may institute certain criteria that limit participation of some transgender students, according to the proposal.
By 2024, the number of states that had passed legislation barring transgender girls and women from girls' and women's sports grew to 25. Riley Gaines, who became a prominent anti-transgender activist after tying Thomas for fifth place in the 200 free at the 2022 NCAA championships, led a lawsuit against the NCAA that is still pending. The reported presence of a transgender athlete on the roster of the San Jose State University volleyball team sparked forfeits from five teams, including four within the Mountain West Conference. Athletes and an SJSU assistant coach sued the conference.
The topic became a major issue in the 2024 presidential election, with Republicans reportedly spending hundreds of millions on ads criticizing Kamala Harris and Democrats for supporting transgender rights, including transgender athletes in women's sports. In December, the Department of Education withdrew its proposed rule as the administration prepared to change hands.
A 2023 poll conducted by The Washington Post and the Kaiser Family Foundation found the majority of Americans believe transgender girls and women should not be allowed to compete in girls' and women's sports.