(The Hill) — Olympian gymnast Simone Biles on Friday night clashed with conservative activist Riley Gaines over a transgender athlete’s participation on a Minnesota high school’s softball team.
Gaines railed against a post on social platform X from the Minnesota State High School League that celebrated Champlin Park High School’s first softball state championship win.
“Comments off lol,” Gaines wrote, referencing MSHSL’s X settings. “To be expected when your star player is a boy.”
The pitcher on Champlin Park’s team identifies as transgender and pitched a shutout, delivering a 6-0 win over Bloomington Jefferson High School on Friday.
“You’re truly sick, all of this campaigning because you lost a race,” Biles responded to Gaines, a former collegiate swimmer, calling her a “bully” and a “straight up sore loser.”
Gaines, a student athlete turned political pundit, has become a vocal critic against the participation of transgender athletes in girls and women’s sports. Her rise on the right came after tying for fifth place in the 2022 NCAA Championships with transgender swimmer and LGBTQ advocate Lia Thomas.
“You should be uplifting the trans community and perhaps finding a way to make sports inclusive OR creating a new avenue where trans feel safe in sport,” Biles continued in her thread on Friday. “Maybe a transgender category IN ALL sports!!
Earlier this year, Gaines joined President Trump at the White House when he signed an executive order barring the participation of trans athletes in sports that align with their gender identity. This order prompted an investigation into the Minnesota high school sports governing body and the state’s federal funding, which the North Star State is fighting in court.
The former University of Kentucky swimmer responded to the 11-time Olympic medalist’s defense of the young athlete, calling her remarks “disappointing.”
“It’s not my job or the job of any woman to figure out how to include men in our spaces,” Gaines wrote on X. “You can uplift men stealing championships in women’s sports with YOUR platform.”
“Men don’t belong in women’s sports and I say that with my full chest,” she added.
Last month, a conservative group on behalf of three softball players sued the North Star State over its 2015 transgender athlete policy, local outlets reported.
Later on Friday night, Biles called out Gaines once more, writing on X: “Bully someone your own size, which would ironically be a male.”