When voters go to the polls in five states in November, they can weigh in on whether men who claim to be transgender can compete in women’s sports and whether minors should be able to undergo controversial transgender medical treatments.
Organizers in Arizona, Colorado, Missouri, Nebraska, and Washington succeeded in putting measures on the ballot to reverse pro-transgender policies or establish clear rules prioritizing biological sex in sports.
Transgender advocates say that men who identify as women should be allowed to compete in women’s sports and that minors should be able to receive so-called puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones.
Supporters of the ballot initiatives, however, argue that men enjoy inherent biological advantages in most sports, giving them an unfair advantage regardless of how they might identify. Supporters also argue that minors cannot provide meaningful consent to potentially irreversible medical interventions and point to reviews in Europe and the United States questioning the evidence supporting such interventions.
Women’s Sports
Arizona Proposition 138 requires all schools and athletic associations to designate athletic teams as male, female, or coed based on the biological sex of the athletes as recorded at birth and prohibits them from authorizing use of private spaces not designated for a person’s sex. The proposal would also establish a private right of action by which a female student athlete may sue for discrimination.
Colorado Proposition 109 states that school-sponsored interscholastic or intramural athletic teams shall be “expressly designated” by biological sex, either for men, women, or coed, and that any sport designated for women “shall not be open to a male student or participant.” The proposition allows men’s sports to admit women athletes if there is no women’s team available.
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Nebraska Initiative 442 similarly designates school sports as male, female, or coed, and states that girls’ sports will not be open to males.
Washington state law already requires students to undergo a physical examination before taking part in sports, but Washington Initiative 638 would use that examination process to verify biological sex, to ensure “equity, safety, and competitive balance in sports intended exclusively for female students.”
Gender Medicine
Colorado Proposition 110 states that “a health care professional or other person shall not knowingly perform, prescribe, administer, or provide any surgery to a minor for the purpose of altering biological sex characteristics.”
Missouri Amendment 3 would reverse a previous ballot initiative that passed in 2024, also designated Amendment 3. The 2024 amendment added a fundamental right to reproductive freedom to the Show-Me State’s constitution.
This year’s Amendment 3 allows the Legislature to restrict abortions, except in cases of emergency, fetal anomaly, rape, or incest.
The amendment also states that “no gender transition surgeries shall be knowingly performed on children under eighteen years of age, and no cross-sex hormones or puberty-blocking drugs shall be knowingly prescribed or administered for the purpose of gender transition to children under eighteen years of age.” These restrictions will not apply to children “born with a medically verifiable disorder of sex development” or to treat any disease unrelated to gender transition.
A Close Call
Women’s sports advocates in Maine gathered signatures for a ballot initiative titled “An Act to Designate School Sports Participation and Facilities by Sex.” While Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows announced in March that her office found the initiative valid with more than the required number of signatures, she reversed course after the Maine Women’s Lobby and EqualityMaine helped launch a legal effort against the measure.
Had the measure qualified, Maine would have become the sixth state asking voters to weigh in directly on transgender participation in sports.
While many consider these issues to break down as conservative or liberal, the Maine organizer behind the ballot initiative previously told the Daily Signal that Maine is too “progressive” to allow men to compete in women’s sports. He claimed the group has “tons of Democrats and independents alongside Republicans in our midst.”
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