Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis signed a bill that protected girls sports in the state.
The bill he signed, The Fairness In Women’s Sports Act, “says that athletic teams or sports that are designated for females are open to females, and we’re going to go based off biology, not based off ideology when we’re going sports. The bill defines a student’s biological sex based on the student’s official birth certificate at the time of birth.”
DeSantis says this new law would ensure women have the opportunity for “scholarships and competition at the highest level,” but it also allows athletes or institutions the “right to civil remedies” if there is a violation of the bill.
In response, the NCAA threatened to not bring any championship competition to the state, saying “when determining where championships are held, NCAA policy directs that only locations where hosts can commit to providing an environment that is safe, healthy and free of discrimination should be selected. We will continue to closely monitor these situations to determine whether NCAA championships can be conducted in ways that are welcoming and respectful of all participants.”
DeSantis said on Fox in response to the NCAA, “to hell” with their events.
“...as these bills were going through various legislatures, I remember the NCAA put out a statement saying any state that enacts this, we’re not going to hold events there. And so I called the Speaker of the House in Florida and I said, ‘did you hear what they said?’ And he’s like, ‘yeah,’ I said, we definitely got to get this done.
You can’t be cowed by these organizations, or particularly by woke corporations from doing the right thing.
And so my view was throughout this whole time, we have to protect our girls, it is discriminatory to force them to compete against biological males. And so if the price of having a tournament is that I have to deny equal opportunity to hundreds of thousands of young girl and women athletes throughout Florida, I am much more willing to stand with the girls. And to hell with these events.”