Concern mounts that White House-backed bill could preempt state laws protecting women’s sports

Concerns are mounting that a White House-backed bill pending in the U.S. Senate could override state laws banning trans-identified males from competing in women’s sports, with one senator introducing an amendment to address the matter.

The White House urged the Senate to pass the Protect College Sports Act in a statement of administration policy published Thursday, calling the bill a measure that “facilitates clear, commonsense rules and student-athlete protections, preserves opportunities across all athletic programs, and curtails the vexatious litigation plaguing college sports.”

Sponsored by Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, the bill has attracted seven co-sponsors from both parties: Sens. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash.; Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va.; Chris Coons, D-Del.; John Hickenlooper, D-Colo.; Pete Ricketts, R-Neb.; Eric Schmitt, R-Mo.; and Peter Welch, D-Vt.

Despite support from the White House and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, a Christian conservative advocacy group and legislators have raised concerns that the bill could undercut the nationwide effort to bar trans-identified males from women’s sports, an effort President Donald Trump has backed with an executive order threatening to pull federal funding from schools that allow men to compete in women’s sports.

More than two dozen states have passed laws or policies banning trans-identified males from women’s sports. Earlier this year, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld West Virginia’s Save Women’s Sports Act, a major win for the movement to preserve women’s sports.

“The Protect College Sports Act, which addresses issues such as Name, Image, and Likeness agreements and student athlete transfers, creates an unnecessary risk of undermining the Supreme Court win, President Trump’s Executive Order, and many other hard-earned victories for women and girls,” Alliance Defending Freedom CEO and Chief Counsel Kristen Waggoner said in a statement Thursday. 

ADF has represented several female athletes who lost competitions to trans-identified male athletes. Such cases have become a rallying cry for requiring athletes to compete on teams matching their biological sex rather than their stated gender identity.

“The bill sets general eligibility rules for college athletes and then preempts states from maintaining their own eligibility rules, which could include laws saying men are ineligible for women’s teams,” Waggoner added. “For weeks, ADF has warned Congress that activists could misuse the bill’s existing preemption language to argue that states’ women’s sports laws can no longer be enforced.”

Waggoner urged lawmakers to adopt a “simple fix” by amending the bill to “ensure the preemption of state laws is narrow.” 

“We are living in a moment where lawyers can’t even define what a woman is. There’s no room for ambiguity. Let’s not undo the hard-fought gains or pass permanent legislation that could jeopardize these victories. We are thankful for President Trump’s legacy of protecting women’s sports to date and we don’t want to see it undone.”

As written, the legislation declares that “An individual is eligible to participate on a varsity sports team or in intercollegiate athletic competition if the individual — (1) is a student athlete; (2) meets uniform academic standards established by the relevant intercollegiate athletic association, conference, or institution; (3) is not a professional athlete; and (4) complies with established rules that restrict eligibility for violations of State or Federal law.”

While the legislation lets sports governing bodies restrict prospective athletes who “used an illegal or performance enhancing drug” or “participated in sports-wagering activities or sports-related event contracts,” it does not explicitly state that athletic associations or conferences can ban trans-identified males from women’s sports.

The legislation lists state laws, rules, regulations, and requirements that “shall not be preempted, displaced, or supplanted” — but women’s sports laws aren’t on that list.

In response, Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., filed an amendment Thursday clarifying that “any law, regulation, rule, requirement, or standard that prohibits biological men from playing in women’s sports” would be protected.

Hawley’s amendment follows an X post Wednesday in which he warned the legislation “PREEMPTS Missouri’s law banning men in women’s sports,” calling it a “big, big problem.”