Sixteen female athletes have sued the NCAA seeking to ban transgender women from competing in women’s sports.
According to The Free Press, the lawsuit is centered around Lia Thomas, the swimmer who competed as a male at the University of Pennsylvania for three years before transitioning to female.
Thomas set records throughout the swim season and ultimately won the 2022 NCAA championship in the 500-yard freestyle.
The suit calls for the NCAA to “reassign” awards won by trans athletes to biological women who would have otherwise won them, and calls for “damages for pain and suffering, mental and emotional distress, suffering and anxiety, expense costs and other damages due to defendants’ wrongful conduct.”
In addition to Riley Gaines, the former Kentucky swimmer who has been outspoken about not receiving a trophy after tying Thomas in an NCAA championship race, other plaintiffs include swimmers Kylee Alons, Katie Blankenship, Réka György, Julianna Morrow, Lily Mullens, Kate Pearson, Carter Satterfield and Kaitlynn Wheeler.
In addition to 12 swimmers, one volleyball player, one tennis player and two track competitors were among the plaintiffs.
The suit alleges that biological men who have gone through puberty have inherent athletic advantages “which no woman can achieve without doping.”
The suit claims the NCAA violated the fourteenth amendment by “destroying female safe spaces in women’s locker rooms,” in enabling Thomas to use the women’s locker room in competition.
The suit alleges that “naked men possessing full male genitalia to disrobe in front of non-consenting college women” cause “situations in which unwilling female college athletes unwittingly or reluctantly exposed their unclad bodies to males, subjecting women to a loss of their constitutional right to bodily privacy.”
Former NC State swimmer Kylee Alons spoke to the Free Press about having to change in a “storage closet” because she did not want to disrobe in the presence of Thomas at the NCAA championships.
“I was literally racing U.S. and Olympic gold medalists and I was changing in a storage closet at this elite-level meet,” Alons told the outlet. “I just felt that my privacy and safety were being violated in the locker room.”
Former Kentucky swimmer Kaitlyn Wheeler recalled Thomas walking past her as she was changing into her swimsuit and naked from the waist up.
“Never in my 18-year career had I seen a man changing in the locker rooms. I immediately felt the need to cover myself,” Wheeler said. “I could feel the discomfort of the other girls in there.”
The lawsuit was filed in federal court in Georgia, the site of the 2022 NCAA championships.
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