Donald Trump, Jr., co-head of the Trump Organization and the eldest son of President Donald Trump, weighed-in on the issue of transgender inclusion in sports Tuesday with a tweet. And you can probably guess where he stands without having to read another word.
He called the achievement of a trans track star “yet another grave injustice to so many young women who trained their entire lives to achieve excellence.”
What’s true about Trump Jr.’s tweet is that Cecé Telfer earned top-ranked honors among division 2 NCAA women, as The Keene Sentinel reported in December: “Senior Cecé Telfer ranks first in the country in the 60-meter hurdles (personal-best 8.33 seconds), second in the pentathlon (3735 points), sixth in the 60-meter dash (7.57) and is tied for 17th in the high jump (1.65 meters).“
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But that doesn’t make her the NCAA’s top woman track star in the nation.
And on February 18th, Telfer reportedly showed she is a force to be reckoned with yet again: “Senior CeCé Telfer won three Northeast-10 Conference titles Sunday to lead the Franklin Pierce University women’s track & field team and earn Most Outstanding Track Athlete honors at the NE10 Championships” in Northampton, Mass. Again: just at the NE10, not the entire United States.
But even though she set records, she didn’t win everything in every competition. Telfer was only one of the women who achieved greatness that weekend.
“Seven records were set on Saturday, including AIC’s Serge Gilbert in the 60 meter hurdles (7.90) and Franklin Pierce’s CeCé Telfer in the 60 meter hurdles (8.54),” reported Northeast10.org.
But that’s not how the far right-wing online tabloid The Daily Caller told her story, with a screaming headline that caught Trump Jr.’s eye: “BIOLOGICAL MALE IS TOP-RANKED NCAA WOMEN’S TRACK STAR.”
Trump Jr. tweeted a link to the story, telling his followers, “Identify however you want, to each his own, but this is too far and unfair to so many.”
While there are many arguments to be had about “biological sex,” often by people whose only knowledge of biology was in high school, one of the best explanations we’ve seen is from the leading provider of transgender healthcare in the United States: Planned Parenthood, an organization threatened with defunding by the Trump Administration.
“Some people call the sex we’re assigned at birth ‘biological sex,’” reads the explanation on the Planned Parenthood website. “But this term doesn’t fully capture the complex biological, anatomical, and chromosomal variations that can occur. Having only two options (biological male or biological female) might not describe what’s going on inside a person’s body.
“Instead of saying ‘biological sex,’ some people use the phrase ‘assigned male at birth’ or ‘assigned female at birth.’ This acknowledges that someone (often a doctor) is making a decision for someone else. The assignment of a biological sex may or may not align with what’s going on with a person’s body, how they feel, or how they identify.”
There’s much more, and we encourage Donald Trump, Jr. to read it here.
