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The 2025 National Defense Authorization Act, which passed the Senate on Wednesday and will head to President Donald Trump’s desk, includes provisions banning biological males from playing women’s sports at U.S. military academies.
“The NDAA also permanently prohibits men from playing on women’s sports teams at all military academies,” read part of a Dec. 9 administrative statement addressing the bill from Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Ala.
Trans athletes have been barred from competing in NCAA sports since Feb. 6, when the NCAA updated its gender eligibility policy to comply with Trump’s executive order “Keep Men Out of Women’s Sports.”
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A federal appeals court also recently allowed the Pentagon to temporarily apply its ban on transgender military personnel.
The latest bill is one of the last items Congress will take up in 2025.
Lawmakers banded together to pass the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), a roughly $901 billion defense policy package that unlocks funds for several of the Trump administration’s national defense priorities.
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The measure passed the upper house by a bipartisan vote of 77 to 20. It’s a perennial legislative exercise that lawmakers undertake, and one that normally comes and goes without much fanfare, given that Congress usually ends the year with it.
Other provisions, such as requiring the Pentagon to release never-before-seen footage of boat collisions in the Caribbean in exchange for fully funding the War Department’s travel fund, raised eyebrows but did not slow the package’s success.
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The provision comes as lawmakers demand more transparency into the Trump administration’s strikes on suspected drug boats, and in particular, as they call for the release of footage of a Sept. 2 double strike on a ship.
“This defense authorization bill, while it doesn’t contain as much defense stuff as many of us would like, is a step in the right direction,” said Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D.. “And I think the defense appropriations bill, which we hope to vote on later this week, is another example of the investment we must make, to ensure that, in a dangerous world, we are prepared to defend America and its interests.”
