Riley Gaines NCAA swimmer Riley Gaines reads an email from her phone during Gov. Kim Reynolds Harvest Festival at the Elwell Family Food Center at the Iowa State Fairgrounds on Saturday, October 14, 2023 in Des Moines.
ArticlesOlympicsBy Kevin Harrish on

Women’s boxer Imane Khelif of Algeria was allowed to compete in the 2024 Paris Olympics despite failing gender eligibility tests at the 2023 World Championships, and that has led one notorious anti-trans activist to make false claims about her.

Khelif won the first match of her run through the Olympics on Thursday when her opponent, Angela Carini of Italy, withdrew from the fight 46 seconds in after taking two punches, saying it was “impossible to continue.” This led anti-trans activist Riley Gaines to falsely claim that Khelif is a “male” and that the boxing match was “glorified male violence against women.”

“After 46 seconds and a few hits to the face by a male, Carini forfeited the fight. Call me crazy, but It’s almost as if women don’t want to be punched in the face by a male as the world watches and applauds. This is glorified male violence against women,” Gaines said in a post on X, the social media website that was formerly known as Twitter..

She then made a separate post on the issue, saying, “Men don’t belong in women’s sports,” which received well over 100 million views in just a few hours.

Gaines is not the only person to make statements like this, but the claim that Khelif is a “male” is untrue. Gaines routinely refers to transgender women as “men” and “males,” but Khelif is not transgender. She was not born a male and never transitioned. In fact, it would have been illegal for Khelif to transition from male to female in Algeria – the nation she represents and holds a passport. Algeria is a predominantly conservative Muslim nation that outlaws gender transitions.

Khelif has always been a woman since birth, has always identified as a woman, and has always competed as a woman with no issues until she was disqualified from the 2023 World Championships by the International Boxing Association. However, that disqualification has been called into question with the International Olympic Committee calling it a “sudden and arbitrary decision” with no “due process” or “proper procedure” after they had competed for years without issue.

Here is an excerpt from the IOC statement:

“These two athletes were the victims of a sudden and arbitrary decision by the IBA. Towards the end of the IBA World Championships in 2023, they were suddenly disqualified without any due process.”

“According to the IBA minutes available on their website, this decision was initially taken solely by the IBA Secretary General and CEO. The IBA Board only ratified it afterwards and only subsequently requested that a procedure to follow in similar cases in the future be established and reflected in the IBA Regulations. The minutes also say that the IBA should ‘establish a clear procedure on gender testing.

“The current aggression against these two athletes is based entirely on this arbitrary decision, which was taken without any proper procedure – especially considering that these athletes had been competing in top-level competition for many years.”

While many reports have suggested that Khelif was disqualified from the competition for having elevated testosterone and XY chromosomes, there is little to no evidence that was actually the case. As Irish public broadcaster RTE determined, these reports seem to all stem from comments made by IBA president Umar Kremlev on his Telegram channel that was then published by the Russian state news agency TASS.

In fact, the IBA has since released a statement specifically stating that Khelif did not undergo testosterone examination, but instead was ruled ineligible by a “separate and recognized test,” but the specifics of that test “remain confidential,” though it’s not clear why.

“The athletes did not undergo a testosterone examination but were subject to a separate and recognized test, whereby the specifics remain confidential. This test conclusively indicated that both athletes did not meet the required necessary eligibility criteria and were found to have competitive advantages over other female competitors,” the IBA statement read.

Gaines’ claims simply go against reality. Khelif is a female by every definition.

[Riley Gaines, RTE]

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