a dozen girls walked off a cross-country course to protest one trans teammate. fox says a "state superintendent" backed them. wrong guy.
via The Columbian, The Seattle Times and KATU
On Tuesday afternoon in Camas, Washington, roughly half the girls in Camas High School singlets walked off the start line of a league cross-country meet against Battle Ground rather than run against their own teammate.
The Seattle Times counted "approximately a dozen." The Columbian said more than a dozen walked the first 50 meters and left the course. The teammate is a transgender girl who switched from the boys' team to the girls' team midseason, KATU reported, and the district says it followed state guidelines. She is a minor. We are not naming her, and neither did the Seattle Times, which said so.
who actually said what
By Thursday morning the story had a Fox headline: a "heartbroken Washington state superintendent" said there would be "no consequences" for the girls. Most people will read "state superintendent" as the state's schools chief. It was not him.
The quotes belong to John Anzalone, superintendent of the Camas School District, in an OutKick interview. He said seeing students "in the middle of this" had been "the most heartbreaking" part for him, and that the point was to let the girls who walked off "do so" and "not feel any repercussions." Neither "heartbroken" nor "consequences" is in his quotes; both are in the headline.
The actual state superintendent, Chris Reykdal, did weigh in, on MyNorthwest, and he also defended the walkout, calling it the girls' "First Amendment right." He then called I-638, the measure that would ban trans girls from girls' school sports, "unnecessary." So the man Fox's headline made you picture backs the protest and opposes the ban, in the same segment. That is a less useful headline, which is presumably why it is not the one you got.
what the vote would do
I-638 is on Washington's November ballot, sponsored by Let's Go Washington, per KUOW. The Seattle Times says it would ban trans girls from K-12 girls' sports and require students to submit medical documentation of their "biological sex." The state athletic association's current policy, KATU reported, says students "do not need to provide medical or legal documentation" to play on teams that match their gender identity.
Everyone involved agrees the girls were free to walk off. The vote in November decides whether one girl is free to walk on. It also tends to be decided by people who, as we wrote last month, mostly do not know a trans person.
