Utah’s Republican governor Spencer Cox says he will veto the bill protecting female-only sports that the state legislature passed Friday. The bill prevents “biological males” — determined by “an individual’s genetics and anatomy at birth” — from girls’ leagues.
On Friday, Cox wrote on Twitter that “we care deeply about Utah’s female athletes and our LGBTQ+ community.”
We can now confidently strike female athletes from that statement since there is no better way to ruin female sports than to allow males to dominate female leagues.
It may be that Cox thinks he’s found a clever compromise. The Associated Press reports:
After throwing his support behind a proposal to create a first-of-its-kind commission of experts in Utah to make decisions on individual transgender student-athletes aiming to participate, Cox said he was stunned on Friday night as lawmakers advanced and ultimately passed an amended proposal that included an outright ban on transgender student-athletes competing in girls leagues.
The last governor to veto such a bill, South Dakota’s Kristi Noem, also claimed to have found some brilliant way to split the baby. She hadn’t, of course — and paid a heavy political price for selling out. Noem later reversed her decision and signed legislation preserving female-only sports. Let’s hope Cox, too, will come to his senses.