This month will mark the three -year anniversary of the infamous draw of Riley Gaines with Lia Thomas in the Women’s Swimming Championship of the NCAA of 2022.
At that time, Thomas, previously known as Will Thomas, was acclaimed by the liberals as the next “civil rights icon” in sports, making interviews with ESPN, NBC News and “Good Morning America”.
Gaines was an aspiring dentist who had to wait to raise his own trophy until Thomas ended with photographs.
In 2025, things are different.
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After a failed attempt to qualify for the Olympic Games in Paris, Thomas is subject to multiple demands against the NCAA, the Ivy League and the University of Pennsylvania, led by Gaines and other swimmers who had to share areas with Thomas. Penn is also under investigation by the Department of Education for possible violations of Title IX.
Gaines is now acclaimed as an icon of sports rights by conservatives with a proposed bill that bears the name of their progress through the Legislature in Georgia, the site of its 2022 draw with Thomas.
Other states have taken their own measures to prevent transgender inclusion in women’s sports, and President Donald Trump signed an executive order to prohibit it at the national level. The data show that most Americans have opposed transgender inclusion in women’s sports and girls and that the problem even influenced voters in the 2024 elections.
“I think we should send a note of thanks to people like Will Thomas, I really do, signed and sealed by me. I will sign the thank you note, I will write it, because I think he gave us the elections,” Gaines told Pak Gazette Digital.
How the transgender in sports changed the 2024 elections and lit a national counterculture
“There was much that was wrong with Joe Biden, his administration and the Democratic Party as a whole outside the sports things … but this was the perfect visual. It’s like the episode of South Park … painted the image that many of us were worried about a time, but it came true.”
TO national output survey Made by the Legislative Women’s Action Committee for Women for America, it found that 70% of moderate voters saw the issue of “Donald Trump’s opposition to transgender children and men who interpret sports of girls and women and women and transgender men and men who use girls and women’s baths” as is important for them. In addition, 6% said it was the most important issue of all, while 44% said it was “very important.”
And Trump beat surveys among women, especially young women.
Riley Gaines, former swimmer of the All-American University of Kentucky, speaks before the governor of Florida, Ron Desantis, presidential candidate, at the Greenville Convention Center on June 2, 2023. (McKenzie Lange/Staff/USA Today Network)
As much as Gaines want to thank Thomas for getting attention to the problem, he also feels sympathy for the athlete and has even tried to express that sympathy to Thomas.
“I have communicated several times, especially at the beginning. I honestly, I hate to say it, but I got in touch by apologizing, how to feel that I needed to explain and almost apologize for feeling the way I did it because we were so conditioned to believe that it was hurtful, it was exclusive, it was not kind to take the stay he had,” Generes said.
Former teammates of Lia Thomas Sue Upenn, Ivy League for the thrust of the Pro-Trans ideology
“Then, initially I got in touch, with the hope of having a conversation to explain more and express my apologies for feeling like me. And, as I said, it hurts to say that.”
Thomas has not responded to the request for Pak Gazette Digital comments.
If Gaines and Thomas connect today again, Gaines could be less apologized. But even then, she would still expect to offer Thomas a little respite.
“Even so, of course, I would welcome a conversation, but it would not be in a way that apologizes for feeling the way I do. It would be in a way that, of course, could be constructive and encourage Thomas to arrive next to common sense,” he added. “But there will be no tremor in my voice. I don’t apologize for anything.”
Since the rise of Thomas in 2022, other transgender athletes have attracted a similar national controversy and political participation, including the former volleyball player of the San José Blaire Fleming State University and the openly transgender athletics corridor Sadie Schreiner.
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And although Gaines opposes that these athletes are allowed to participate in sports with biological women, he sees them as victims of a movement to allow transgender athletes in women’s sports.
“I also see them as victims. I really do. They have been victims of movement. Unfortunately they have fallen into the lie that they were not created uniquely and intentionally to the perfect image of God. And that is a horrible message to send anyone,” Gaines said.
Fleming was pushed to the National Attention Center in autumn after multiple opponents lost when demands were presented alleging that the school retained the birth sex of Fleming of his teammates.
The situation led Trump to comment on Fleming while campaigning in October during an event of the Pak Gazette City Council.
Sjsu Trans player Blaire Fleming and her teammate Brooke Slusser went to a magic show and had thanksgiving together in Las Vegas despite a continuous demand on Fleming being transgender. (State Athletics of Truong/San José)
Like UPENN with Thomas, SJSU is also under investigation by the Department of Education for its management of Fleming.
Unlike Thomas, Fleming’s gender identity was a hidden secret because the volleyball player has no history of competing in male sports or children. Thomas competed in the UPENN male team two years before the transition to women.
Schreiner became one of the first known victims of Trump’s recent executive order. After the NCAA changed its gender eligibility policy to prevent biological men from competing in female competition to comply with the Trump order, Schreiner’s School, the Rochester Institute of Technology, told Pak Gazette Digital that the athlete would not compete in future competitions.
Then, Schreiner defeated a handful of adolescent opponents in the US Open Masters Championship.
“I have my own thoughts about the behaviors of these men,” Gaines said. “I certainly believe that there is a level of narcissism. I think there is a level of law and total contempt for everyone around these people. But, ultimately, I think they are also victims, which is the sad reality of the gender ideology movement.
“The gender ideology movement is destructive to all, except the people who benefit … It is the greatest medical scandal that this world has seen.”
