Transgender swimmer Lia Thomas will not take her chance as an athlete at the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris.
Transgender swimmer Lia Thomas speaks out about backlash, future plans to compete – ABC News
Thomas, the biological male who won the 2022 women’s national championship as a swimmer for Penn, has officially lost a legal battle against World Aquatics in which Thomas argued that his ban on competing against women was “invalid and unlawful.”
The 25-year-old was banned from swimming in the women’s category in the summer of 2022 when the sport’s governing body banned all swimmers who had gone through “any part of male puberty” from competing against biological women.
World Aquatics welcomed the court’s decision to uphold the rule keeping Thomas out of the women’s pool, calling it “a major step forward in our efforts to protect women’s sport.”
“World Aquatics is committed to creating an environment that promotes equality, respect and equal opportunities for athletes of all genders, and we reaffirm this commitment,” the organization said, according to The Guardian .
It’s worth noting that World Aquatics has not banned transgender athletes from competitions. The organization has introduced an “open” category for transgender swimmers. The new category debuted at last year’s World Cup in Berlin, but failed to attract a single competitor.
