Superintendent Tom Horne is continuing to defend a law that bans transgender children from participating in school sports in Arizona.
In a press conference Wednesday, Horne appeared alongside 45 girl athletes who support the ban of transgender girls from playing in all-girls’ sports leagues.
“I feel very deep sympathy for people who feel they were born in the wrong body,” Horne told the media. “But I also believe that biological males should not compete against females, because it’s unfair, and it will ultimately undermine women’s sports which have benefited so much under Title Nine, and we can lose the whole thing.”
Horne also cited a Washington Post poll that stated 60 percent of respondents are opposed to “biological men” competing with “biological women.”
This comes one month after the parents of two transgender girls in Arizona filed a lawsuit challenging the law signed in 2022.
Read the full response to that lawsuit from Tom Horne’s defense team here.