President Donald Trump halted $175 million in federal funding to a massive Ivy League university for allowing transgender athlete Lia Thomas to compete against biological women.
The University of Pennsylvania’s athletics policies allowed Thomas to compete on their women’s swim team and use the women’s locker room and bathrooms while exposing male genitalia.
As part of the administration’s Title IX investigation into Trump’s prestigious undergraduate alma mater, UPenn could face losing all of their federal funding, according to Fox Business.
The White House’s rapid response team posted the news segment to their X account, claiming the funding-related punishment is due to the university’s ‘policies forcing women to compete with men in sports.’
‘Promises made, promises kept,’ it added Trump’s often-repeated tagline.
While $175 million has already been frozen for UPenn from contracts with the Department of Defense and Health and Human Services, the administration is now warning that all federal funding for the university is at stake.
‘This is just a taste of what could be coming down the pipe for Penn,’ an official said, according to the network. ‘A proactive punishment from the President to pull back discretionary spending going to the school from DoD and HHS.’
A spokesperson for the Philadelphia-based Ivy League said it did not receive any official notification or details, but that they are aware of the reports of the suspensions of funds.
‘It is important to note, however, that Penn has always followed NCAA and Ivy League policies regarding student participation on athletic teams,’ the spokesperson said in an email to NBC News.
‘We have been in the past, and remain today, in full compliance with the regulations that apply to not only Penn, but all of our NCAA and Ivy League peer institutions.’
Trump signed an executive order last month prohibiting biological men who now identify as women from competing in women and girls sports.
The action claims that allowing transgender athletes to compete in women’s sports ‘is demeaning, unfair, and dangerous to women and girls, and denies women and girls the equal opportunity to participate and excel in competitive sports.’
Thomas is perhaps the most infamous example of a biological male being allowed into women’s athletics on the collegiate level and dominating in a sport where they were mediocre when competing against other men.
Penn made national headlines in 2022 when the transgender student competed on the women’s swim team. Thomas went on to become the first transgender woman to win an NCAA swimming championship.
Trump said in his order that he will rescind all funds from any education programs and institutions that ‘deprive women and girls of fair athletic opportunities, which results in the endangerment, humiliation, and silencing of women and girls and deprives them of privacy.’
The issues of men competing in women’s sports is a two-pronged issue.
The first is that the biological differences that advocates against transgender athletes claim is diminishing the strides made in women’s sports.
The other is that female athletes are often subjected to sharing a locker room or bathroom with the transgender athletes – even if they still have male genitalia.
Trump signed an executive order once back in the Oval Office proclaiming the federal government will only recognize two sexes on passports, drivers licenses and other official identification documents.
He also signed an action banning trans people from serving in the military and another restricts gender-affirming treatment and care for anyone younger than 19 – both of which are temporarily blocked as they are argued in court.