Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman says “common sense” led him to ask the NCAA to restore all records, titles and recognitions to female athletes who were defeated by biological males.
Coleman joined attorneys general from 25 other states in signing a letter urging the NCAA to “restore all appropriate recognitions to the women athletes who were wrongfully denied all that they earned.”
“This letter is not about being anti-anyone. It's not about meanness. It is not about being divisive,” Coleman told Kentucky Today.
“What this letter is about is joining 25 other attorneys general and asking the NCAA to apply common sense to their titles, to their championships. That common sense is following up with what the Trump administration asked the NCAA to do; and that is to clean its books, to ensure that if a male playing a female sport, purporting themselves to be a female, if they were a champion, if they ranked above the female, it's allowing the females to actually rightfully be awarded their championships, their titles, their records.”
Coleman says the letter follows up executive orders issued by Pres. Donald Trump that recognized only two sexes, male and female and prohibited biological males from competing in women’s sports.
Coleman acknowledges that the letter does not have the force of law, but said he hopes the NCAA will voluntarily comply, so a lawsuit will not be necessary.
“What we are asking for is for the NCAA to just do the right thing. I don't want to take an adversarial posture,” said Coleman. “I don't want to go down that road yet because we saw the NCAA respond appropriately to the president's executive order earlier this year. We saw the NCAA prevent future competition between males and females. I want to take an optimistic bent and think this is a practical suggestion to help the NCAA do the right thing.”
Coleman said it was important for Kentucky to sign-on to the letter because former UK swimmer Riley Gaines has been at the forefront of the effort to protect women’s sports.
At the 2022 NCAA championships, Gaines lost a trophy to biological male Lia Thomas, who identified as female and was forced to share a locker room with him.
“She has this is a validation of what she has fought for ever since that regrettable incident where she had her own experience with a male being ranked above or equal to her in a female sport,” Coleman said.
The letter also asks the NCAA to apply the ban on biological males competing against women not just to competition but also to practice.
“This is very practical notion of males and females intermingling in the locker rooms, males and females intermingling in restrooms and training facilities,” said Coleman. “It prevents situations that could cause harm and could cause challenging situations and environments where these athletes need to be focused on competition, on improvement, on strategy, not on how they're able to navigate a locker room with the opposite sex being present unclothed.”
The Attorney General said it is “a bit of a shock” that the question of who is male and female and whether men can compete against women has even become an issue.
“Who would have thought just a few years ago that this would be a dominant issue, that this wouldn't even be a conversation. So, my hope is we can get back to common sense, and I can get back to spending most of my time and resources being a cop and protecting Kentuckians,” Coleman said.
“But it's important that we protect our girls. It's important we protect the integrity of girls' sports so that my daughters don't have to worry about seeing men unclothed in the locker room … But my prediction is that this is not something that dominates our conversation going forward this year.”
You can read the entire letter here.
You can see and hear the entire interview with Attorney General Russell Coleman on the Kentucky Today podcast by clicking here.
Russell Coleman is one of 26 attorneys general in signing a letter urging the NCAA to “restore all appropriate recognitions to the women athletes who were wrongfully denied all that they earned.” (KT file photo)
