Penn agrees to deal with Trump admin on trans athletes, removes Lia Thomas records

The University of Pennsylvania has agreed not to allow transgender women to participate on its women’s sports teams and remove the records of Lia Thomas, a former student and the first transgender woman to win a NCAA Division I national championship, the Education Department announced Tuesday.

The resolution agreement — which comes after the department found Penn violated Title IX, the federal law against sex discrimination, when it allowed Thomas to join the women’s swim team for the 2021-22 season — requires the university to award Thomas’s titles to the next place finisher and personally apologize “to each impacted female swimmer.”

The NCAA, which oversees college sports at more than 1,000 colleges and universities nationwide, did not immediately respond to questions about whether it also intends to rescind Thomas’s 2022 championship win. The organization barred transgender women from participating in women’s college sports in February, shortly after President Trump signed an executive order stating the U.S. opposes “male competitive participation in women’s sports” and threatened schools’ federal funding.

NCAA President Charlie Baker, a former Republican governor of Massachusetts, testified before a Senate panel in December that fewer than 10 NCAA athletes are transgender.

The resolution agreement between Penn and the Education Department also requires the school, Trump’s alma mater, to issue a public statement that it will comply with the administration’s interpretation of Title IX and adopt “biology-based” definitions of the words male and female.

Thomas previously held three of the six Penn women’s swimming and diving individual freestyle records.

An attorney who represented Thomas in a previous legal challenge to a World Aquatics policy banning most transgender women from competitive swimming did not immediately return a request for comment.

On his first day back in office, Trump signed an order stating the federal government recognizes only two unchangeable sexes.

The university’s statement will be displayed “in a prominent location on its main website and on each of its websites for women’s athletics,” according to the agreement.

In a statement, the university said it will comply with the Education’s Department’s interpretation of Title IX but “will not—on the basis of sex—exclude female students from participation in, deny female students the benefits of, or subject female students to discrimination under, any athletics programs.”

“In addition, in providing to female student-athletes intimate facilities such as locker rooms and bathrooms in connection with Penn Athletics, such facilities shall be strictly separated on the basis of sex and comparably provided to each sex,” the university said.

J. Larry Jameson, Penn’s president, said the school’s commitment to fostering a welcoming environment for its students is “unwavering,” but that it must also follow federal requirements, including executive orders and NCAA eligibility rules.

“This is a complex issue, and I am pleased that we were able to reach a resolution through the standard OCR process for concluding Title IX investigations,” he wrote Tuesday in a letter to the Penn community, referring to the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights.

He emphasized that Penn has never had a transgender student-athlete policy of its own and was in compliance with federal law and NCAA rules when Thomas was a student.

“While Penn’s policies during the 2021-2022 swim season were in accordance with NCAA eligibility rules at the time, we acknowledge that some student-athletes were disadvantaged by these rules. We recognize this and will apologize to those who experienced a competitive disadvantage or experienced anxiety because of the policies in effect at the time,” Jameson wrote.

He added that the Trump administration’s investigation, if left unresolved, “could have had significant and lasting implications for the University of Pennsylvania.”

In March, the administration said it would suspend $175 million in federal contracts awarded to Penn, citing Thomas’s participation.

Jennifer Bing, vice president of advancement at the National Center for LGBTQ Rights, said the organization hopes Penn will reconsider the decision.

“This administration’s use of bullying and threats to try to force universities to disavow their commitment to basic equality for all students is deeply disturbing. We are disappointed to see such an important and respected university give in to these demands,” Bing said. “As we have seen with law firms and other entities subjected to similar threats, capitulating to these unlawful demands is extremely harmful, both to the institution and to our society. We hope Penn will reconsider this decision.”

Education Secretary Linda McMahon called the agreement “another example of the Trump effect in action.”

“Today is a great victory for women and girls not only at the University of Pennsylvania, but all across our nation,” she said Tuesday in a statement. “The Department commends UPenn for rectifying its past harms against women and girls, and we will continue to fight relentlessly to restore Title IX’s proper application and enforce it to the fullest extent of the law.”