ACLU Of Wyoming Slams Gordon Over Letter On Trans Sports Policy

The American Civil Liberties Union of Wyoming is unhappy with Governor Mark Gordon over his signature on a letter to the NCAA on the organization's Transgender Sports Policy.

Eight other Republican governors signed the letter besides Gordon. You can read the letter here. It criticizes an NCAA decision to allow the national governing body of every sport to decide whether transgender athletes should be allowed to compete in the women's sports competition for each sport.

The letter from the governors says that people born as males retain unfair advantages. It reads in part: "Science proves that it is fundamentally unfair for a biological male to compete against a biological female – that does not change when someone declares themselves as being of a different gender. The National Institutes for Health found that there is on average a 10% difference between the top performing males and females in athletic competition. In high-level athletic competition, a 10% difference is massive – and can even be insurmountable."

But in a Tuesday news release, Libby Skarin, deputy executive director of the Wyoming ACLU is quoted as saying:

“Whatever Gov. Gordon and this letter’s cosigners might say, this isn’t about leveling the playing field for student-athletes or protecting fairness in women’s sports. If it were, these governors would be tackling the actual threats to women’s sports such as severe underfunding, lack of media coverage, sexist ideologies that suggest that women and girls are weak, and pay equity for coaches and players.”

“This letter to the NCAA is just another attempt to erase transgender people from society while stirring up support from their base of anti-trans activists with fear-mongering tactics and discriminatory rhetoric that harm some of the most vulnerable people in our state.”

The Tuesday news release also asked whether the letter is an attempt to use trans people "as a political football."

You can read the ACLU release here.