The University of Pennsylvania has agreed to exclude transgender athletes from women’s sports competitions, following a U.S. Department of Education investigation tied to swimmer Lia Thomas’s participation during the 2021–2022 season. The settlement, reached with the Trump administration, also includes a formal apology to female athletes who claimed to have been placed at a disadvantage.
UPenn will revise its athletic records based on athletes’ biological sex but emphasized that it had been following NCAA rules and Title IX at the time. Lia Thomas, who transitioned from the men’s to the women’s swim team, became the first transgender athlete to win an NCAA title in 2022. She has consistently said that her transition was about personal identity, not gaining a competitive edge.
Three former swimmers—Grace Estabrook, Margot Kaczorowski, and Ellen Holmquist—filed a lawsuit against the university, the NCAA, the Ivy League, and Harvard, alleging they were silenced after expressing discomfort about Thomas’s presence on the team and in the locker room. They say they were referred to counseling services and warned that speaking out would label them as transphobic. One of the women said the team had been assured Thomas would not use the women’s locker room—a promise that was broken at the start of the 2021 season.
The number of transgender athletes in U.S. collegiate sports remains very small, but the issue has become a flashpoint in the country’s political debate, especially in the lead-up to the 2024 election. Striking a balance between inclusion and fairness in athletics remains a fault line in American society.
