Politics
FIFA anti-discrimination partner warns against Olympic-style transgender ban
The head of FIFA’s anti-discrimination partner is calling on the international soccer body to not adopt a ban on transgender athletes at the Women’s World Cup, after the Trump administration publicly announced its intention to pressure the organization to do so last week.
Andrew Giuliani, the head of the White House World Cup Task Force, told Blue Light News Thursday that getting FIFA to guarantee that “women play in the Women’s World Cup and not biological men” could represent a lynchpin issue during planning negotiations for the 2031 tournament.
If successful, the endeavor would represent a major victory for the Trump administration’s efforts to bar transgender women from competing in women’s and girls’ sports domestically and abroad. Earlier this year, the International Olympic Committee adopted a blanket ban for its female categoriesthat paralleled an earlier White House executive order.
But Piara Powar, the executive director of anti-discrimination group Fare network, warned that such a restriction would only further stigmatize transgender athletes and marginalize women with intersex characteristics.
“We think it’s important that even if a ban comes into force for the World Cup in 2031 it should not be embedded in FIFA regulations permanently,” Powar wrote in a text message to Blue Light News. “FIFA should not go the way of the IOC and exclude human beings from participation in football.”
FIFA did not respond to requests for comment.
The organization currently has no centralized sex-verification regime, instead requiring each national federation to verify the eligibility of its players before submitting rosters, including investigating “any perceived deviation in secondary sex characteristics” and maintaining documentation of its findings.
The IOC’s policy, meanwhile, dictates that athletes competing in female categories undergo a one-time genetic screening.
Powar said such a ban at FIFA would impact women with medical conditions known as differences in sex development, or DSDs, which can manifest as testosterone levels outside the typical female range and having male chromosomes.
Jon Holmes, spokesperson for the advocacy group Football v Homophobia similarly warned that women with DSDs would “bear the brunt of this.”
He suggested that the administration’s efforts are largely performative — noting that “there’s no suggestion anyone is near international level,” referring to transgender female soccer players.
Payoshni Mitra, an advocate for abolishing sex testing in women’s sports, however, said in an interview Friday that it was too early to speculate about a policy that doesn’t exist, but noted that she “will be very, very surprised if suddenly they come up with a very exclusionary policy.”
Mitra said she’d hope that FIFA acts “in a way that is based on science,” adding: “If they come up with a policy, the policy will be based on science, evidence-based science, and also should take into account athlete well-being and the other conditions that concern these policies.”
FIFA has yet to formally announce the location of the 2031 tournament, for which the U.S., Mexico, Costa Rica and Jamaica have submitted the sole joint bid. Giuliani said Thursday that the organization had already told President Donald Trump that the U.S. would host the contest.
Powar pleaded with other sporting groups to consider the human price of hosting their tournaments in the U.S., despite the lucrative commercial appeal of the country.
“We would urge all sports bodies to think of the credibility of their sport and the harmful impact of accepting all U.S. conditions of hosting — it may come at the cost of excluding participants,” Powar wrote. “And in football, a sport that has always been the most open and accessible, that could be devastating.”
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Firebrand Republican Rep. Nancy Mace announced Monday that she will not run for the South Carolina Senate seat held by the late Lindsey Graham.
“I’m not running for the U.S. Senate, not because I’m backing down from a fight, but because the one I’m already in matters right now,” she said in a video announcement.
Her decision comes after a fifth-place primary finish in her run for governor earlier this year and as the race to succeed Graham is already taking shape.
Mace began exploring the viability of a potential bid just hours after Graham’s death became public, two people familiar with her thinking told Blue Light News at the time, but decided against a second statewide bid in as many months.
Her decision effectively guarantees she will not be serving in elected office once her term ends early next year.
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