Gavin Newsom, self-described leader for LGBTQ+ issues, signals interest in restricting trans women athletes

This story was originally reported by Orion Rummler of The 19th. Meet Orion and read more of his reporting on gender, politics and policy.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat and one-time star surrogate for former President Joe Biden and former Vice President Kamala Harris, a fellow Californian, asked conservative activist and commentator Charlie Kirk for advice on how his party can build its own version of the frenetic support of the MAGA movement.

Kirk’s immediate answer was that Newsom, and other Democrats, should vocally support bans on transgender women playing sports with other women.

“Would you do something like that? Would you say, ‘no men in female sports?’” Kirk asked, during a sit-down interview for Newsom’s new podcast, which aired its first episode on Thursday.

That question, poised by the 31-year-old founder and president of the influential conservative youth group Turning Point USA — who reportedly had a better seat for President Donald Trump’s swearing-in ceremony than most members of Congress — comes at a critical juncture for transgender Americans. For months, transgender Americans have worried if Democrats will stand up for them under a presidential administration hostile to their rights, and as a Republican-controlled Congress prioritizes anti-trans legislation.

That fear has not been misplaced. In the past few months, Democrats in New Jersey, Massachusetts, New York and Texas took Trump’s win as a sign that their party needs to step away from defending trans rights, particularly equal access in school athletics, for fear of losing voters. They have pointed to Trump’s multi-million dollar anti-trans campaign ads and the effectiveness of “flooding the zone” with such rhetoric.

Now, Newsom’s discussion with Kirk is the most high-profile example yet of a Democrat appearing to endorse a blanket ban on trans women joining women’s sports teams. Even as congressional Democrats have put up a near-united front to block such a ban from becoming law, Newsom’s comments further signal that some Democrats are willing to compromise on issues affecting trans people in order to gain more voter support — and not just when it comes to trans athletes.

“Well, I think it’s an issue of fairness. I completely agree with you on that … it’s deeply unfair,” Newsom responded. Kirk pushed again, asking if Newsom would speak out against a specific athlete, a junior at Jurupa Valley High School in California. Kirk prodded Newsom further, saying that he could see the governor wrestling with the question.

“I’m not wrestling with the fairness issue. I totally agree with you,” Newsom said. “By the way, as someone with four kids, two daughters — and a wife that went, God forbid, to Stanford and played on the junior national soccer team … I revere sports. And so the issue of fairness is completely legit.”

Newsom went on to say that he appreciated how Kirk and other Republicans had “weaponized” this issue over the past few years — a phrasing to which Kirk quickly took issue. Newsom conceded that conservatives had simply been “highlighting” the issue.

“Completely fair on the issue of fairness. I completely agree. So that’s easy to call out, the unfairness of that. There’s also a humility and a grace, that these poor people are more likely to commit suicide, have anxiety and depression, and the way that people talk down to vulnerable communities is an issue that I have a hard with as well,” he added.

Transgender Americans currently face an onslaught of executive orders from a presidential administration that, from day one, has signaled its opposition to gender diversity as a whole. Part of that policy onslaught has dealt with school sports.

Following Trump’s executive order mandating a ban on trans girls playing sports with other girls in school, the largest college sports governing body has banned trans women student-athletes from competing in women’s sports. Out of over 500,000 student-athletes attending NCAA schools, fewer than 10 are transgender, NCAA President Charlie Baker said during a congressional hearing in December.

Kirk advised Newsom that, to get Democrats “out of the wilderness,” he had an opportunity at the state level to denounce transgender women playing in women’s sports. He pointed to public opinion polls that suggest that allowing trans women to compete with other women isn’t a popular policy, including among Democrats.

“No, I agree with you. We’re getting crushed on it,” Newsom said.

The former San Francisco mayor built his political career in part by bucking popular opinion. In February 2004, Newsom broke state law when he issued marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Those marriages became known as San Francisco’s ‘Winter of Love’ and breathed new life into the nationwide campaign for same-sex marriage.

That history is part of why state and national LGBTQ+ advocacy groups, as well as other California Democrats, have responded to Newsom’s comments with disappointment and outrage.

“Right now, transgender youth, their families, their doctors, and their teachers are facing unprecedented attacks from extremist politicians who want to eviscerate their civil rights and erase them from public life,” said Equality California Executive Director Tony Hoang in a statement. “Instead of standing strong, the governor has added to the heartbreak and fear caused by the relentless barrage of hate from the Trump Administration.”

“Sometimes Gavin Newsom goes for the Profile in Courage, sometimes not,” said California Assemblyman Chris Ward and state Sen. Caroline Menjivar, who head the state’s LGBTQ+ legislative caucus, according to the AP. “We woke up profoundly sickened and frustrated by these remarks.”

Lily Weaver, a trans woman, attorney and California state employee based in Los Angeles, was also affected by what Newsom said. She’s worked for the governor. And after she read about his remarks, she went to the gym — where, while swimming in the pool, the other women were doing laps around her. They’re stronger swimmers than she is. And it caused her to reflect: These conversations around fairness in women’s sports always seem to portray people like her as inherently stronger, inherently faster than cisgender women. To her, that idea is rooted in adherence to a belief in male supremacy — and she wishes more people would reject this idea.

“I have yet to find an argument for the total exclusion of trans women from women’s sports that is not rooted in an assumption of male supremacy, when you take it apart and look at it. That’s concerning,” she said.

The kinds of conversations that she wishes took place around fairness in women’s sports, when it comes to transgender women athletes, is an acknowledgement that all women’s bodies are different —including trans women. Hormones affect their bodies differently. That may mean extra steps need to be taken in individual sports to ensure that competitions are fair, she said, but total bans shouldn’t be considered.

And at the end of the day, she said, the people in power having these conversations should remember that trans people in their lives are listening.

“I think that it would be wonderful if the folks having these conversations about trans people remember that trans people work for them. The parents of trans people work for them. The partners of trans people work for them,” she said.