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Minnesota education agencies face a deadline Friday from the U.S. Department of Education to change their policies regarding trans athletes. Today, more than 40 school board members from districts across the state openly support compliance with the DOE as the deadline approaches.
School board members wrote a letter to Saint Paul State leaders earlier this week — Education Commissioner Willie Jett, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison and Minnesota State High School League Executive Director Erich Martens — urging them to comply with President Donald Trump’s administration on the issue.
“How do we protect all students in our district. Whether in the locker room or on the playing field,” wrote Prior Lake Savage Area School Board member Lisa Atkinson. “As school districts, we can’t risk a loss of funding. This is really important to us. This is an opportunity for our state to find a way to put policies in place that truly protect all students.”
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The sun shines on the Minnesota State Capitol on Monday, Feb. 12, 2024, in St. Paul, the opening day of the 2024 session of the Minnesota Legislature. (AP Photo/Steve Karnowski)
Board members also expressed concern over reductions in federal funding “that could harm the educational programs, extracurricular activities and resources of more than 875,000 students statewide.”
Trump’s Feb. 5 executive order “Keep Men Out of Women’s Sports” states that schools that allow biological males to compete in women’s sports will be subject to federal funding freezes.
Ellison, who has been a strong supporter of trans athletes in women’s sports and even filed a lawsuit against Trump and the U.S. Department of Justice over its recent Title IX enforcement efforts, responded to the letter in a statement.
“School sports are not only a good way to exercise, they help kids form friendships, give them a sense of belonging, and teach them important life lessons, like how to work as a team, how to treat your competitors with respect, and how to win with grace and lose with dignity. Letting Minnesota’s very small number of transgender students play on their school sports teams doesn’t hurt anyone, but separating them does. The exclusion is a violation of the Minnesota Human Rights Act, which has protected the rights of trans children to participate in all extracurricular activities for decades,” Ellison said via Fox 9.
“I, too, am concerned about the Trump administration’s threats to cut education funding for Minnesota’s children, but this matter is currently before the courts. The federal government’s threats violate the U.S. Constitution, Minnesota law and Title IX itself.
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Players from Champlin Park and Eagan shake hands after the quarterfinals of the Minnesota girls softball state tournament. (Amber Harding/OutKick)
Meanwhile, several female athletes have taken steps to try to push their states to change their policies as well.
Three anonymous female softball players have filed a lawsuit against state agencies after having to confront a trans pitcher at Champlin Park High School last season. Trans pitcher Marissa Rothenberger led Champlin Park to a state championship in the spring, with one of the best postseason stat lines in all of Minnesota.
“It’s really upsetting to know that. [Ellison] does not take the rights of girls and women seriously. It allows boys to compete with girls, which is dangerous and completely unfair. Knowing that AG Ellison fully supports letting boys and men take advantage of women in sports is absolutely disgusting and wrong,” an anonymous player told PK Press Club Digital.
Meanwhile, Kendall Kotzmacher, a former White Bear Lake High School softball player, has publicly spoken out against the state and Gov. Tim Walz for letting men play in women’s sports, especially after Walz himself coached high school football decades ago and saw the physical prowess of male athletes up close.
“As a coach, you should see the differences and the big difference that exists between biological males and biological females,” Kotzmacher told PK Press Club Digital.
Last March, the state legislature failed to pass a bill that would have banned transgender athletes from playing women’s sports, the “Preserving Girls’ Sports Act.” He was one voice short of getting to Walz’s office. Meanwhile, MP Liish Kozlowski, who identifies as “non-binary,” called the bill “another version of state-sanctioned intimidation and genocide.”
