Democrat congressman defends comments against men in women's sports amid backlash
A Democratic member of the U.S. Congress is doubling down as he faces calls to resign after expressing concern about trans-identified male athletes competing in female sports.
Rep. Seth Moulton, D-Mass., who ran in the Democratic presidential primary in 2020, reacted to Democrat losses in the 2024 election by suggesting that the party's push for allowing trans-identified male athletes to compete in female-only athletic contests may have played a role in the Republicans securing control of both chambers of Congress and the presidency.
In a statement to The New York Times published last Thursday, Moulton lamented that "Democrats spend way too much time trying not to offend anyone rather than being brutally honest about the challenges many Americans face."
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"I have two little girls, I don't want them getting run over on a playing field by a male or formerly male athlete, but as a Democrat I'm supposed to be afraid to say that," he added.
Moulton defended his comment during an appearance on MSNBC over the weekend.
"I was just speaking authentically as a dad about one of many issues where I think we're just out of touch with the majority of voters."
"I stand by my position," Moulton said. "You know, maybe I didn't get all the words exactly right, but the point is that the backlash I have received proves my point that we can't even have these discussions as a party."
Moulton highlighted how the chairman of the Massachusetts Democratic Party "wouldn't even return my phone call" as he stressed "we've got to be able to have these debates."
"We have a wing of our party that shames us, that tries to cancel people who even bring up these difficult topics and frankly shames voters," he said.
"This is the same group of people who told us to defund the police, who told us that there wasn't a problem at the southern border, who told us that inflation was transient, whatever that means, and who told us that [President Joe] Biden was just fine," he said.
"We've got to be willing to have these debates," he told viewers. "I'm willing to have my mind changed."
Moulton expressed gratitude for "really good conversations in just the last few days with LGBTQ advocates and others, some of whom agree with me, others who don't but are willing to engage in a thoughtful discussion rather than just trying to cancel one person or another."
Host Alex Witt elaborated on the backlash Moulton has received since making his comments, including the resignation of one of his top staffers and calls for the congressman to resign. She noted that Moulton voted against a bill that would have banned trans-identified male athletes from competing in women's sports, which the lawmaker believed "went too far."
A screenshot of the Slack channel that "records summaries of calls to Moulton's office" showed that the chair of Tufts University's Political Science Department informed Moulton's office that "he consulted with his colleagues and doesn't want our office to contact Tufts about internships and they won't facilitate internship opportunities for students with us," The Boston Globe reported Tuesday.
David Art, the Tufts University professor in question, told the newspaper, "I definitely said other things in addition to that" when pressed in an interview about whether or not he pushed to cut ties with Moulton's office.
Speaking to The Globe, Moulton concluded, "[Tufts is] teaching their students that you can't debate contentious issues."
"That's frightening. That sounds like China," Moulton asserted. "This hurts the Tufts students that don't meet their professors' ideological purity tests."
Moulton asked: "If Tufts can't even accommodate an opinion shared by most Americans, how will it deal with Republican students?"
A report released by the public opinion research firm Blueprint last week identified the belief that Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris "is focused more on cultural issues like transgender issues rather than helping the middle class" as the most frequently cited reason why swing voters who selected President-elect Donald Trump over Harris rejected the vice president. Seventy-eight percent of such voters agreed that Harris' position on the issue was a reason not to vote for her.
Concerns about trans-identified male athletes participating in women's sports stem from real-world examples of biologically male athletes dominating women's sports. For example, Lia (Will) Thomas broke women's swimming records and became a NCAA Division I national champion after joining the University of Pennsylvania's women's swimming team in 2021 following three years of competing on the men's swimming team.
Opponents of the participation of trans-identified male athletes in women's sports attribute the strong performance of Thomas and other such athletes to the biological differences between men and women that give males, on average, an inherent advantage over their female counterparts in athletics.
USA Powerlifting has listed "increased body and muscle mass, bone density, bone structure, and connective tissue" as some of the factors that give males a leg up in athletics.
Outcry over the participation of trans-identified male athletes in women's sports has prompted 26 states to pass legislation or implement regulations requiring athletes to compete on sports teams that correspond with their biological sex rather than their gender identity.
President-elect Trump has signaled his intention to take federal action on the contentious issue, including by vowing to ask Congress to clarify that Title IX civil rights protections that require equal opportunities for women and girls in education prohibit trans-identified males from competing in women's sports.
With complete Republican control of the federal government slated to begin next year, it is likely additional votes will take place on the bill banning trans-identified males from competing in women's sports at the federal level that Moulton previously voted against.
Ryan Foley is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: ryan.foley@christianpost.com
