ESPN contributor Sarah Spain has sparked controversy with her outspoken criticism of the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) recent ruling against allowing transgender athletes to participate in women’s sports. Her comments come in the wake of a decision that has stirred significant debate within the sports community.
In late March, the IOC announced that a one-time SRY gene test would be implemented to uphold the principles of “fairness, safety, and integrity” in female sports categories. This decision is aimed at addressing ongoing debates about gender eligibility and ensuring a level playing field.
The ruling follows contentious incidents involving boxers Imane Khelif and Lin Yu-ting, who faced scrutiny over their gender eligibility for the Paris 2024 Olympics after failing tests conducted by the International Boxing Association (IBA). These high-profile cases have brought the issue of gender testing in sports to the forefront.
Spain highlighted the specifics of the new gender testing protocol, explaining that female athletes will now undergo this singular test to determine if they possess the SRY gene, which indicates male sex development. This gene test, considered less intrusive than other testing procedures, involves taking a saliva, cheek swab, or blood sample.
The presence of the SRY gene, located on the Y chromosome and typically found in men, would render athletes ineligible to compete in women’s sports. The IOC believes this approach balances the need for fairness while minimizing the invasiveness of testing methods.
Sarah Spain has slammed the IOC for their rules to ban transgender athletes from competing
Transgender athletes are now blocked from taking part in women’s sports at the Olympics (pictured: openly trans athlete Laurel Hubbard, now retired, in the Tokyo Games in 2021)
If athletes are found to have it, they will not be eligible to compete in women’s sports.
‘The outcome of this new policy is that all trans women will be banned from female categories, many athletes with differences of sex development will be banned, and every single woman who wants to compete will be subjected to a test to determine if she is indeed, in the eyes of the IOC, a real woman,’ Spain said, in a deliberately disapproving tone.
Later in her podcast, she says: ‘What does it say about the general state of the world that the IOC is introducing these policies now?
‘Going back in time, reintroducing policies that were already deemed dangerous and doing it at a time when persecution of trans people is a political cudgel as opposed to because of a problem that is emerging that they’re trying to have an answer to.
‘It feels, as with most trans policy, a solution looking for a problem.’
Spain has never hidden her disdain for the Trump administration. Earlier this year at the Winter Olympics, she said she felt ‘ill’ sitting near JD Vance when the Vice President traveled to cheer on US athletes.
Spain, 45, was covering the women’s hockey game between the US and Czechia when Vance turned up too.
‘Twelve minutes into the first period, that area suddenly is awash with large men in suits with earpieces. And here comes JD Vance carrying a child and a bunch of security, and eventually Marco Rubio,’ she said in a recap of the incident.
Spain went viral in the Winter Olympics for saying she felt ‘ill’ sitting near JD Vance
Spain has never made any secret of her disdain for the Donald Trump administration
‘When I see JD Vance’s eyeliner face, I literally feel ill, like a basilisk had looked you in the eye and death was awaiting you on the other side.
‘And I don’t even believe in that, but my body felt like when you’ve been spooked and you have a little tingle that feels like, “ooh, something’s not right.”‘
She also claimed that the Secret Service detail were ‘blocking half the ice. We’re trying to watch a hockey game.’
At a later hockey game involving the US and Canada, Spain saw Vance again, but this time he was with boxer and MAGA-adjacent influencer Jake Paul.
‘[Vance] brought a little demon friend, Jake Paul. Talk about only the finest people representing America,’ she said.
In what would have unquestionably further upset Spain over the latest IOC developments, Trump took credit for trans athletes being banned from the Games.
‘Congratulations to the International Olympic Committee on their decision to ban men from women’s sports,’ Trump wrote at the time on Truth Social.
‘This is only happening because of my powerful Executive Order, standing up for Women and Girls!’
The next Olympic Games will be held in Los Angeles in the summer of 2028.
