The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee has announced monumental changes ahead of the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.
Inside its Athlete Safety Policy guidance, the USOPC quietly declared it would adhere to one of President Donald Trump’s earliest executive orders from February.
In fact, while the guidance was issued in June, according to the New York Post, the committee updated its eligibility rules on Monday to add one of the most consequential changes in American sports history.
‘It’s hard to applaud an organization for merely following the law.’
In the added text, the committee said it is “committed to protecting opportunities for athletes participating in sport.”
The policy continued, saying the “USOPC will continue to collaborate with various stakeholders with oversight responsibilities … to ensure that women have a fair and safe competition environment consistent with Executive Order 14201.”
While the new policy is not blatantly clear, the executive order that it purports to align with most certainly is.
RELATED: New Olympic president strikes huge blow to transgender athletes ahead of 2028 games in LA
Executive Order 14201, Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports, has been used for months to justify the protection of women’s sports and spaces by barring males from participating in “all-female athletic opportunities” or entering “all-female locker rooms.”
Schools have continued to defy natural law, but the executive order has laid the ground work to allow the Department of Education to open investigations and apply punishments to offending institutions.
Since news of the USOPC rule change broke, women’s sports activists and organizations have reacted positively to the news but have remained cautious in the amount of praise they give.
“It’s hard to applaud an organization for merely following the law, but nonetheless, this is a win,” NCAA champion swimmer Riley Gaines wrote on X.
The Independent Council on Women’s Sports added, “We thank the Trump administration and the USOPC for taking this important step to preserve fairness and integrity in women’s sports.”
Speaking to Blaze News, former gymnast and national women’s champion Jennifer Sey said there are still steps that need to be taken to ensure fairness at the upcoming Olympics.
RELATED: ‘She’s never had to compete against a man’: Female athletes respond to Simone Biles’ pro-trans rant
“The USOPC has essentially agreed to comply with federal law. It seems unnecessary to applaud an organization for that, but here we are,” Sey told Blaze News.
Sey noted that while she was “thrilled” that the Trump administration made the organization do the right thing, the policy lacks specific details.
“The next step must be to confirm they will test for sex to ensure compliance.”
The former athlete said that a lot of people have been asking her what the new rules mean for the Olympics as a whole: “This is different than an outright Olympic ban in that it is only for the U.S., U.S. Olympic teams and competitors in the U.S. Olympic movement.”
Sey continued, “Next, we need the [International Olympic Committee] to establish the same rules to ensure that women’s sports in the Olympic Games are protected and for women only.”
Hope is high for the IOC though, as newly appointed president Kirsty Coventry said in late June that she intends to “protect the female category, first and foremost.”
Coventry added, “But we need to do that with a scientific approach and with the inclusion of the international federations who have already done a lot of work in this area.”
For now, those who have worked hard to ensure fairness in women’s sports seem dissatisfied with the vague wording the aforementioned organizations have used. Real change cannot come soon enough, with hundreds of women having already lost competitions to men, with more happening all the time.
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
Fearless, Olympics, Transgender, Women’s sports, Woke, Female athletes, Sports