Houghton University president speaks out after his athletes lose to transgender woman in track and field
After seeing his student-athletes lose to a biological male during a sporting event this past weekend, Dr. Wayne D. Lewis Jr., president of Houghton University, issued a strong statement against biological males participating in women's sports.
The statement, titled "In Defense of Women's Athletics," is a lengthy call to action from Lewis, the sixth president of the private Christian university in upstate New York.
"Biological males’ participation in women’s athletics is wrong," wrote Lewis, the first African-American president of the university. "Most Americans and most of the world know it to be wrong. A fringe agenda under the guise of making school and collegiate athletics more inclusive for transgender people has grown to the place of now unfairly displacing gifted and hardworking female athletes, obliterating the historic achievements and records of female athletes of the past, and threatening to dismantle the opportunities and protections for girls and women in sport trailblazing leaders fought so hard to create and protect."
"Too many leaders, parents, professional athletes, and people of goodwill have been silent as female athletes are humiliated, silenced, and robbed of hard-earned opportunities. That silence is complicit with the fringe agenda that threatens to dismantle girls’ and women’s athletics."
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This view shows the start of the women's 100-meter final at the 2000 Olympic Summer Games in Sydney. (Adam Pretty/Getty Images)
Lewis’s statement comes after the All-Atlantic Regional Championships in track and field, where transgender athlete Sadie Schreiner of Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) won the women’s 200-meter dash.
"I currently serve a Christian university as its president," he wrote. "I believe God has formed each of us, men and women, with intention and purpose. I further believe sex and gender are a divine prerogative and are neither separate from each other nor subject to change. However, my assertion that biological males’ participation in women’s athletics is wrong is not a Christian position. It is a moral position."
"While I currently serve a Christian university, most of my career has been in the public sector as a teacher, professor, administrator, and state education chief. If I served in any of those roles again, my position would be the same," he continued.
Lewis previously explained his stance on WHAM 1180, saying the same during an interview that it is a "moral position."
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"When I see young women with ‘Houghton’ written across their uniform … at a competitive disadvantage, sometimes losing opportunities that are hard-earned, there is no way that I, as their president, will continue to sit on the sidelines and refuse to advocate for change," he said.
"Throughout human history and to the present, most of the world and most Americans have upheld the truth that men and women have important distinguishing characteristics," Lewis continued in his statement. "American society is organized based on that understanding. Our organization of sport exists based on that understanding. Stating the obvious and widely supported truth that men and women have important biological differences is not a position of hatred or bigotry. It is common sense."
"While I believe most policy attempts to be inclusive of persons who identify as transgender are likely well-meaning, I struggle to understand how leaders with the best interest of girls and women at heart could advocate for or endorse practices that not only place female athletes at a competitive disadvantage, but also subject them to disrespect and embarrassment and place them at greater risk for harassment and assault."
To conclude his statement, Lewis looked for support in his stance.
"Enough is enough," he said. "I will not sit by silently as a university president whose female student-athletes step weekly onto tracks, courts, and fields to compete but, in some cases, are forced to do so on playing fields we know to be unfair. I hope you will join me."
Schreiner, who reportedly goes by the name "Sadie Rose," broke two women’s track and field records at RIT, setting the 200-meter record with a 25.27-second time in January. Schreiner also broke the 300-meter record with a 40.78-second finish, per the National Desk.
A view of hurdles at a track and field event. (C. Morgan Engel/NCAA Photos via Getty Images/File)
The Liberty League, the Division III conference in which RIT participates, honored Schreiner as its Women’s Track and Field Performer of the Week in January.
The Independent Council on Women’s Sports sent a letter to the Liberty League in February, expressing their concern about Schreiner’s participation in women’s track and field.
"The only way sport can be fair and equal for women is with a protected female category that excludes competitors with male advantage," the letter reads.
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To back its argument, the letter cited World Athletics, the governing body of track and field, and its handbook, specifically Rule C3.5, which is "Eligibility Regulations for Transgender Athletes."
"World Athletics wants to give equal opportunities to all athletes to participate in and excel at the sport, and to provide them with fair and meaningful competition conditions, so that they are motivated to make the huge commitment and sacrifice required to excel in the sport, and so inspire new generations to join the sport and aspire to the same excellence," the rule states.
"The substantial sex difference in sports performance that emerges from puberty onwards means that the only way to achieve the objectives set out above is to maintain separate classifications (competition categories) for male and female athletes. That difference is due to the physical advantages conferred on male athletes by the testes producing much higher levels of circulating testosterone than ovaries produce from puberty onwards in female athletes."
A track runner gets set in the blocks. (John Walton - PA Images via Getty Images)
The NCAA’s current regulations on transgender student-athletes participating in sports at the collegiate level are a by-sport basis, meaning each governing body of that sport will determine if participation is allowed.
RIT did not immediately respond to a request for comment when asked by Fox News Digital.
Scott Thompson is a sports writer for Fox News Digital.
