The US Olympic & Paralympic Committee (USOPC) announced an official policy change this week, issuing a ban on transgender athletes from competing for Team USA in the women's categories at the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
The new policy cites President Trump's recent anti-trans athlete Executive Order 14201 alongside 1998's Ted Stevens Olympic & Amateur Sports Act.
"As a federally chartered organization, we have an obligation to comply with federal expectations," USOPC president Gene Sykes and CEO Sarah Hirshland said in an internal memo on Wednesday.
The USOPC oversees some 50 national governing bodies across sports, including at the youth and masters levels, as well as Team USA's participation in all official Olympic and Paralympic competitions.
The new ban effectively overrides any and all guidelines previously set by various sport governing bodies in the US, and joins the growing number of prohibitive policies affecting primarily transgender women athletes worldwide.
The revised segment — part of the larger USOPC Athlete Safety Policy — does not explicitly use the word "transgender," nor does it explain the ban's function, scope, or application to men's sports.
Notably, only one openly trans athlete has ever competed for the US at the Olympic Games: Nonbinary runner Nikki Hiltz, who was assigned female at birth, participated in 1500-meter track event at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
"By giving into the political demands, the USOPC is sacrificing the needs and safety of its own athletes," National Women's Law Center president and CEO Fatima Goss Graves said in a statement condemning the policy change.
"This rule change is not in response to new research or new guidelines from medical experts in sports," posted advocacy nonprofit Athlete Ally. "Instead, it is the result of mounting political pressure and government hostility toward one of the smallest minorities in society, let alone sports."
The US Olympic and Paralympic Hall of Fame announced their Class of 2025 on Tuesday, with this year's iconic cohort headlined by tennis titan Serena Williams and track legend Allyson Felix.
Alongside four-time Olympic gold medalist Williams and seven-time gold medalist Felix — the most decorated woman in Olympic track and field history with 11 total medals — four other women and one women's team snagged spots in the 2025 class.
Joining the pair are gymnastics icon Gabby Douglas, a two-time team gold medalist and the first Black woman to take individual all-around gold in Olympic history, and three-time beach volleyball gold medalist Kerri Walsh Jennings.
Additional inductees include the gold medal-winning 2004 USA women's wheelchair basketball Paralympic team, five-time Paralympic gold medalist in track Marla Runyan — the only US athlete to have competed in both the Paralympic and Olympic Games — and multi-sport specialist Susan Hagel.
Hagel competed in six Paralympic Games across three different sports — archery, track and field, and wheelchair basketball — picking up four gold and two bronze medals along the way.
Barrier-breakers honored as Class of 2025 Legends
Also earning Hall of Fame honors are two trailblazing Black women, named as the Legends of the Class of 2025.
Renowned volleyball player and 1984 silver medalist Flo Hyman — whose work to bolster Title IX as well as her role helping Team USA to their first-ever Olympic medal in women's volleyball were crucial to growing the sport in the US — will be posthumously celebrated.
Honored alongside Hyman will be 1976 Olympic bronze medalist Anita DeFrantz, the first and only Black woman to medal in rowing.
DeFrantz, the International Olympic Committee's (IOC) first-ever woman member, is still helping to make Olympic history, casting the deciding vote to elect the IOC's first woman president this past March.
The Class of 2025 is the 18th overall group and first since 2022 to enter the Hall of Fame.
Following their July 12th induction, the US Olympic and Paralympic Hall of Fame will bloom to 210 individual and team members.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) approved a proposal to expand the women’s soccer tournament from 12 to 16 teams for the 2028 LA Olympics on Wednesday, solidifying the event’s international importance as the women's game continues to see skyrocketing growth.
"We wanted to do something to reflect that growth, and equally with the United States being the home of the highest level of popularity of women's football," IOC sports director Kit McConnell said on Wednesday.
IOC balloons multiple 2028 LA Olympics women's events
Soccer isn't the only women's event expanding, with additional IOC decisions pushing the total number of women athletes participating in the 2028 LA Games over the 50% line.
The women’s water polo field will grow from 10 to 12 teams to align with the men’s competition, while 3×3 basketball will expand its field from eight teams to 12.
Even more, women’s boxing will gain an additional weight category, and the IOC will incorporate new mixed events across several other Olympic sports.
Ultimately, increased parity will only intensify competition, with the IOC making moves to keep the Olympics in line with the continued demand for and rise of women's sports.
"The message of gender equality is a really important one for us," added McConnell.
Zimbabwean swimming legend Kirsty Coventry made history on Thursday, when she became both the first woman and first African ever elected president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
At 41-years-old, Coventry will also be the youngest president in the organization's 131-year history and the 10th individual to ever hold the office.
"As an nine-year-old girl, I never thought I would be standing up here one day getting to give back to this incredible movement of ours," the five-time Olympian said in her remarks.
An extensive Olympic resume, in and out of the pool
The Auburn University grad and seven-time Olympic medal-winner — including back-to-back golds in the 200-meter backstroke at the 2004 Athens and 2008 Beijing Games — retired from competition after the 2016 Rio Olympics.
At that time, Coventry was already three years into her IOC membership, after initially joining as part of the governing body's Athletes' Commission. She joined the Executive Committee in 2023.
"I will make all of you very, very proud and hopefully extremely confident in the decision you have taken," Coventry said to her fellow members in her acceptance speech. "Now we have got some work together."
That work that awaits Coventry in her eight-year mandate will include navigating the 2028 LA Games and selecting a host for the 2036 Summer Games.
Her first Olympic Games at the helm, however, will be the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy, giving her less than a year to prepare before the Opening Ceremony kicks off.
Coventry to continue IOC efforts to promote gender equity
Coventry will have a few months to adjust before assuming her new office on June 23rd, when she will succeed her mentor, 71-year-old Thomas Bach.
Bach will have served the IOC's maximum 12-year tenure in the role when he steps down, having led the governing body to stage the first-ever Olympic Games with equal numbers of women and men competing — a mark captured at the 2024 Summer Games in Paris.
With gender equity as a driving force in his leadership, Bach also increased the number women serving as both IOC members and in the organization's leadership roles, with women comprising seven of the body's 15-person executive board.
Coventry is one of those seven women, and Bach specifically hand-picked her as his successor.
The legacy she inherits isn't lost on Coventry, both in the efforts of Bach and in the women who paved the way — perhaps none more directly than IOC member Anita DeFrantz, a 1976 Olympic bronze medal-winning rower for Team USA and the only other woman to ever run for IOC president.
Recognizing the election's historic significance, 72-year-old DeFrantz overcame significant health issues to travel to Greece in order to vote for Coventry — with her ballot securing the exact number of votes Coventry needed to win.
"I was really proud that I could make her proud," an emotional Coventry said.