Swimming World Cup's Plan for Transgender Athletes Backfires

The Swimming World Cup's plan to allow transgender and nonbinary athletes to compete at the upcoming event has faltered, after its gender-inclusive, open-category races failed to attract any entries.

World Aquatics introduced the open category in its 50-meter and 100-meter races across all strokes after voting in June 2022 to prohibit transgender women from competing in women's elite races. The category, which is open to those whose gender identity differs their birth sex, was deemed a "pioneering pilot project" on its launch.

However, days before the Swimming World Cup is set to take place on October 6-8 in Berlin, Germany, it has been revealed that no competitors have signed up to compete in the newly created category.

Addressing the lack of athletes signing up for the new category, the governing body said on Tuesday: "The World Aquatics open category working group will continue its work and engagement with the aquatics community on open category events.

"Even if there is no current demand at the elite level, the working group is planning to look at the possibility of including open category races at Masters events in the future."

The news comes at a time when the inclusion of transgender women in women's sports has risen to the fore as a hotly-debated topic. In July of this year, Union Cycliste Internationale, the governing body for sports cycling officially ruled that transgender women would be banned from competing in women's competitions.

Also this year, World Athletics, the international governing body for track and field and other running sports, banned transgender women who began transitioning after puberty from its women's events.

Riley Gaines, a former competitive swimmer for the University of Kentucky, has become a figurehead for the movement to keep those identifying as transgender women out of female sports.

Since tying with transgender athlete Lia Thomas in the 2022 200-yard National Collegiate Athletics Association (NCAA) freestyle, Gaines has campaigned against trans inclusion in women's categories in sport, arguing those with biologically male bodies have an unfair advantage over biological women.

While some say that excluding transgender athletes from women's categories is discriminatory, others say that such inclusion was itself prejudicial as it meant biological women were less likely to achieve highly.

Caitlyn Jenner, a 1976 Olympic decathlon gold medalist who transitioned to female in 2015, has been a vocal critic of transgender women in sports. In April, the Fox News contributor launched an initiative called Fairness First. The political action committee that describes itself as "a big tent movement, non-partisan in nature, with the intention of protecting women and girls in sport—especially in light of recent events with radical gender ideology."

Defending her inclusion in women's events, former University of Pennsylvania swimmer Thomas told ESPN last year that "trans women competing in women's sports does not threaten women's sports as a whole. Trans women are a very small minority of all athletes."

Thomas, who began hormone therapy in May 2019 after her sophomore year, said: "The biggest misconception, I think, is the reason I transitioned. People will say, 'Oh, she just transitioned so she would have an advantage, so she could win.' I transitioned to be happy, to be true to myself."

At the time of her interview, Thomas shared plans to focus on public interest law and civil rights while studying at law school.

"Having seen such hateful attacks on trans rights through legislation, fighting for trans rights and trans equality is something that I've become much more passionate about and want to pursue," she said.

On the opposing side of the debate, Gaines said during a speech at conservative political action group Turning Point U.S.A.'s Young Women's Leadership Summit back in June that she saw the fight as "moral versus evil."

"Myself, being a Christian, I entirely see this as spiritual warfare. It's no longer good versus bad, or right versus wrong, this is moral versus evil," she said at the time.

"And I looked this evil in the eyes...and it's soulless, it's hateful, it's vengeful, it's violent—and I think it's ironic, they do it in the name of love," she added. "They do it in the name of compassion, and tolerance, and acceptance and welcoming—and all of these different terms. But it is not that; it is none of those things. Our argument is rooted in love."

In spreading her message, Gaines said she has passed out pamphlets on Title IX, a statute passed by Congress in 1972 prohibiting exclusion on the basis of sex from federally-funded education programs and activities.

There is disagreement over whether the wording of the statute protects transgender athletes from being discriminated against: while Barack Obama's administration interpreted it as offering protections according to gender identity, others including the Donald Trump administration interpreted it according to a strict definition of biological sex.

In April, President Joe Biden's administration issued a new rule which stipulated that transgender athletes could not be "categorically" banned, but that in some competitive athletic environments, transgender participation may be limited.