U.S. Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Auburn) was swift to blast the 2024 Olympics on Thursday after a video showing a boxer, who was previously disqualified from boxing for “failing genetic testing” handily defeating a female boxer.
Social media was set ablaze on Thursday after a video from the 2024 Paris Olympics showed Algerian boxer Imane Khelif, who is competing in the female division, easily defeating a female opponent. The footage shows Italy’s Angela Carini calling off the fight less than a minute after absorbing a hard punch from Khelif.
The status of Khelif’s sex is ambiguous. Khelif does not identify as transgender. However, Khelif was stripped of several world championship medals in 2023 after the International Boxing Association (IBA) claimed Khelif and several others were “trying to pass themselves off as women.” All the athletes were banned from the Women’s World Championships in India and stripped of all medals.
Note: The quotations provided from the IBA were translated to English from the original Russian.
“Based on the results of DNA tests, we have identified a number of athletes who tried to deceive their colleagues and passed themselves off as women,” IBA president Umar Kremlev said at the time. “The tests have proven that they have XY chromosomes. Such athletes have been excluded from the competition.”
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) said Khelif and Lin Yu-Ting of Taiwan, another boxer the IBA banned in 2023, met the criteria to compete in Paris. However, the IOC did not detail the criteria required to meet eligibility, so it’s unclear what physiological and biochemical similarities Khelif has with either sex.
People on social media expressed contempt for the IOC for allowing the bout to occur, including Tuberville, who stated that Carini should have “never been put in a position where she had to box against a man.”
Tuberville also recently juxtaposed the IOC’s decision to allow the formerly disqualified athletes to compete with the ongoing battle in the United States over the Biden administration’s attempts to inject gender identity into the federal Title IX code.
The proposed Title IX changes aim to add gender identity and sexual orientation to the list of federally protected groups. They also redefine sexual harassment, exposing teachers and students to liability for using biologically accurate pronouns. Schools risk losing federal funding for failing to adhere to the changes.
The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals approved an Alabama-led injunction on Wednesday, preventing the federal government from enforcing the rule in several southern states. However, the issue is far from over, as the proposed rule changes will go into effect for states that have not secured injunctions while the matter continues to be adjudicated in federal court.
“The same party who has celebrated the first female vice president in American history is somehow confused when it comes to identifying the difference between a man and a woman,” Tuberville said on Wednesday. “This is very sad for young ladies across the country who will now be forced to share common spaces like bathrooms and locker rooms with biological males.”
He continued, “The same thing is occurring on the international stage with the Olympics. Two men are scheduled to box against women in the next few days. If Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have their way, boys will be boxing against girls in elementary schools all over the United States.”
