In a year marked by political turbulence and cultural clashes, the United States has witnessed a dramatic escalation in the battle over transgender rights—particularly in the realm of sports. From state legislatures to the Supreme Court, and from college swimming pools to the highest office in the land, the debate has become a defining flashpoint of the nation’s ongoing culture war.
According to Truthout, 2025 has seen an unprecedented surge in anti-transgender legislation. Over a thousand anti-trans bills were introduced in 49 states, with more than 100 passing into law—continuing a five-year streak of record-breaking restrictions on transgender rights. These laws have ranged from bans on gender-affirming care to limits on participation in sports, and they are now being echoed at the federal level. In June, the Supreme Court upheld Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care, effectively paving the way for similar measures in 26 states. The Court is also set to rule on the constitutionality of transgender sports bans, already adopted by 27 states, as well as the legality of prohibiting LGBTQ conversion therapy.
At the heart of the sports debate is Riley Gaines, a former collegiate swimmer from the University of Kentucky. As reported by Mother Jones, Gaines’ rise to national prominence began in March 2022, when she tied for fifth place with transgender athlete Lia Thomas at the NCAA women’s swimming championships. That race, and the controversy that followed, catapulted Gaines into the center of a movement seeking to ban transgender girls and women from competing in women’s sports.
Gaines’ advocacy quickly found favor with conservative politicians and donors. Backed by GOP figures such as the DeVos family, she traveled the country arguing that women’s sports needed “saving” from what she and her allies described as unfair competition from transgender athletes. In February 2025, Gaines stood behind President Donald Trump at the White House as he signed an executive order threatening to defund schools that permit transgender girls to participate in girls’ sports. “You’ve been waiting a long time for this,” Trump told her, underscoring the symbolic importance of the moment.
Despite the heated rhetoric, the NCAA president noted in 2024 that less than 0.002% of college athletes were openly transgender—a tiny fraction that belies the outsized attention the issue has received. Nevertheless, Gaines and her supporters argue that trans athletes are “stealing opportunities from every woman and girl who competes with them.” Alongside other athletes, she filed a federal lawsuit against the NCAA, seeking a nationwide ban on trans girls in girls’ school sports.
By 2025, 29 states had enacted bans on trans girls and women participating in school sports teams that match their gender identity, though some of these laws remain tied up in court. Following Trump’s executive order, both the NCAA and the US Olympic and Paralympic Committee changed their policies to categorically exclude trans women. The Trump administration has also reversed Biden-era protections, issued executive orders defining sex as immutable, and directed federal agencies to curtail gender-affirming care for trans youth.
For Gaines, the campaign is more than a legal battle—it’s a personal crusade. In her memoir, she describes her own experiences growing up in a conservative Christian family and swimming under a demanding coach, Lars Jorgensen, whose harsh methods left a deep mark on the University of Kentucky women’s swim team. Former teammates recall Jorgensen’s verbal abuse and pressure to lose weight, with one writing to school officials, “The damage from Lars’ words and remarks about female bodies last long beyond the four years of collegiate swimming.”
Yet Gaines weathered the pressure, becoming a favorite of her coach and, eventually, a star in the right-wing media ecosystem. She has built a lucrative career from her activism, releasing a children’s book, a memoir, and a clothing line, and commanding speaking fees as high as $25,000. Her social media following has swelled to 1.6 million, and she has become a fixture on Fox News and at conservative events.
Gaines’ activism has not been without controversy. According to Mother Jones, she has publicly broadcast the names and photos of transgender middle and high schoolers, encouraging boycotts and shunning. Critics accuse her of stoking hysteria and profiting from manufactured outrage. Fordham University’s Zein Murib compared Gaines to Anita Bryant, the 1970s anti-gay activist, saying she “is working to create hysteria around a vulnerable group of people for her own political purposes and profit.”
The legal battles have only intensified. With funding from groups like ICONS, led by former athletes and parents, lawsuits have been filed not just against the NCAA but also against individual universities, demanding the erasure of transgender athletes’ records and the exclusion of trans women from women’s teams and locker rooms. The underlying legal arguments, as summarized by Jess Braverman of Gender Justice, contend that “trans inclusion is sex discrimination against cisgender women.” These cases could have far-reaching consequences, potentially undermining constitutional protections for transgender people beyond the realm of sports.
Meanwhile, the impact on the transgender community has been profound. Truthout reports that, since 2024, 55% of transgender people have taken steps to be less visible due to rising harassment and violence. Many transgender youth and their families have left conservative states, some even fleeing the country, as access to gender-affirming care dwindles—even in so-called “safe haven” states. The defunding of the LGBTQ suicide hotline in 2025 has further heightened fears, especially as the 2025 Trans Day of Remembrance Report documented 27 transgender people murdered and 21 who died by suicide between November 2024 and October 2025. Advocates warn that these numbers are almost certainly underestimates, given widespread misgendering in news reports.
The rhetoric from the highest levels of government has only added to the sense of crisis. The Trump administration has issued a national security memo labeling supporters of “extremism on gender” as domestic terrorists, and Vice President JD Vance has implied that transgender advocacy may be part of a “terrorist movement.” Far-right influencers, emboldened by these policies, have targeted LGBTQ authors and activists, branding them as threats and calling for government intervention.
Yet, resistance persists. As the editor of Be Gay, Do Crime explained to Truthout, “Our very existence challenges the fundamental tenets of fascism and exposes the fragility of authoritarian power. We show that gender is diverse and mutable. We challenge the authoritarian myth that people are born into fixed categories and exist only to reproduce for the nationalist state.”
With lawsuits pending, policies shifting, and lives hanging in the balance, the debate over transgender rights and women’s sports has become a microcosm of America’s broader struggles over identity, inclusion, and power. The outcome of these battles will shape not just the future of athletics, but the very fabric of American society.