NFL Hall of Famer Brett Favre has made his position clear on a bill moving through Congress that would block transgender athletes from girls’ and women’s sports.
Favre posted on X Friday, sharing a PK Press Club interview with Sage Steele and Riley Gaines crediting Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., for introducing the Protecting Women and Girls in Sports Act in an effort to keep transgender athletes out of women’s sports. nationally.
“It’s up to these officials to try to solve this problem. There is a clear biological difference between men and women,” Favre said in the video’s caption.
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Former NFL quarterback Brett Favre testifies before the House Ways and Means Committee in the Longworth House office building September 24, 2024, in Washington, DC. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
The Tuberville measure would maintain that Title IX deals with gender as “recognized based solely on a person’s reproductive biology and genetics at birth” and does not adjust it to apply to gender identity. It would prohibit federal funding of sports programs that allow biological males to participate in girls’ and women’s sports.
This would apply to biological men and boys who identify as transgender and are looking to participate in events and leagues for women and girls.
The measure is co-sponsored by 23 Republican senators.
This is not the first time Favre has spoken out on the issue of transgender athletes in women’s sports. The former NFL quarterback spoke out against New Zealand transgender weightlifter Laurel Hubbard, who became the first transgender woman to qualify for the 2021 Olympics.
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Laurel Hubbard of New Zealand salutes after a women’s weightlifting lift at the 2020 Summer Olympics on August 2, 2021, in Tokyo, Japan. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)
Hubbard competed in men’s events before coming out as transgender in 2013.
“This is a man competing as a woman,” Favre said in an episode of his now-discontinued podcast from the time. “It’s unfair. It’s not fair to a man, even if that person wants to be a woman or feels obligated. If you want to become the opposite sex, that’s fine. I have no problem with that. But you can’t compete with…men can’t compete with women.
“If I was a real woman – I can’t believe I’m saying this – and I competed in weightlifting and I lost to this person, I would be beside myself.”
In this podcast episode, Favre also spoke out against transgender BMX rider Chelsea Wolfe, who was selected as an alternate for Team USA’s BMX freestyle event. Wolfe was accused of talking about burning an American flag on the medal podium in a social media post, PK Press Club Digital previously reported.
Favre said Wolfe should not be allowed to compete.
“I wouldn’t let her compete in my Olympics. Go compete for someone else,” Favre said. “Saying this is such a slap in the face to our country. I can’t believe this person could be allowed to participate for our country.
“She should be banned.”
Favre has previously worked with members of the LGBTQ community, including gay former NFL player Esera Tuaolo. Favre appeared on Tuaolo’s podcast in 2020 to discuss head injuries related to playing football.
However, Favre was also accused by some of exhibiting anti-transgender behavior during the 2015 ESPY Awards. During the show, Caitlyn Jenner took the stage to accept the Arthur Ashe Award for Courage, and Favre was seen clapping slowly. The nature of Favre’s slow applause sparked backlash from some with pro-LGBTQ beliefs on social media.
But polls today show that the majority of Americans oppose transgender inclusion in women’s sports, which was a key campaign theme of Donald Trump and other Republicans during the recent cycle .
Former NFL player Brett Favre speaks on stage during SiriusXM at Super Bowl LIV on January 31, 2020 in Miami, Florida. (Cindy Ord/Getty Images for SiriusXM)
Nearly 70% of Americans believe biological males should not be allowed to participate in women’s sports, a study finds. Gallup poll last year.
In June, an investigation conducted by NORC at the University of Chicago asked respondents to weigh in on whether transgender athletes of both sexes should be allowed to compete in sports leagues that match their preferred gender identity rather than their biological sex.
Sixty-five percent responded that it should never or rarely be allowed. When respondents were asked specifically about adult transgender female athletes competing in women’s sports, 69% opposed it.
A national exit poll conducted by the legislative action committee Concerned Women for America (CWA) found that 70% of moderate voters saw the problem with “Donald Trump’s opposition to transgender boys and men playing girls and girls’ and boys’ sports and transgender men using girls and women’s toilets, “also important to them.
And 6% said it was the most important question of all, while 44% said it was “very important.”
