powered by cable. ♪ ♪

[people chanting] >> trans rights are human rights! peter: riley gaines, that video was from april 6, 2023. what was going on, what happened? riley: gosh, it's hard to listen to that, to really relive that. what you just heard was me being ambushed. i was attacked, i was punched, i was shoved, i was pushed. hit in the face by these men who were wearing dresses, which i can fortunately say at least their punches do not really hurt that bad. these protesters that you heard in this video, they ended up holding me for ransom throughout the middle of the night.

this is in san francisco, naturally. these protesters demanded if i wanted to make it home to see my family safely again, i have to pay that money. you might be wondering, where are the police? the police were being held for ransom with me. i'm looking at the officers. i get barricaded in this room. pretty sure we are being held against our will. pretty sure we call that kidnapping. isn't there something you can do to get us out of here? to which they said, no, we are not allowed to do anything. we are not allowed to be seen as anything as an ally unless we lose our jobs. the same community is on the other side of the door calling the officers racist pigs for protecting a white girl like me. yelling some of the heinous, most profane things you could possibly a managed for the four or five hours they had us barricaded in this room. peter: what were you doing at

san francisco state university? riley: i was there to deliver a message. i was speaking, one of the student led chapters invited me to be there. it was a turning point chapter. to speak to the students and some community members wanted to come. the message i was intending to share was very simple. it was a message speaking to the importance of maintaining the integrity of sports, specifically women's sports. and the easiest way to maintain integrity is by keeping men out of our sports. that is what i was there to do. nothing hateful, nothing even opinionated. i was there to share my real life, lived experience and competing against a male, changing in a locker room with a male, the silencing that we face former universities, that is what i was there to speak to before being not just shouted

down, i mean physically attacked. peter: and you recount that incident in your new book "swimming against the tide: fighting for common sense in a world that has lost its mind." before we get into more of the book, when did you start swimming? riley: i started swimming when i was four years old. that is not unique to just me. i would say any elite level swimmer competing at the collegiate or professional level, that is just how it goes. i started swimming when i was four, graduated when i was 22. i dedicated 18 years of my life to my sport which is impossible to put into words the amount of time and hours and the dedication and the sacrifices you have to make to compete at and ultimately be successful at the highest level. but, i was willing. peter: riley gaines, your parents were also athletes. riley: they were.

i'm very fortunate to come from a family of pretty elite level athletes. my dad, he's the youngest of five boys. they all play professional ball. my dad's oldest brother played 10, 12 years with the seahawks. his other brother played with the chargers and the rams and tampa bay and the dolphins. my dad played with the eagles. they are all sec hall of famer's as well, playing at vanderbilt and tennessee. my mom was a division i softball player. my oldest sister, she played softball. she went to ole miss. my brother is in college, he plays football now. my youngest sister, she is still in high school. she is 15. she's an elite level gymnast. i would never ever tell her this, but she's probably the best athlete of all of us. peter: one of the stories you tell in your book is a pool in memphis in the middle of winter. what happened?

riley: yes, so my dad, he does a lot of different business ventures. i never really understood what he did growing up. i don't even think i still understand what his occupation is, but always doing something. he had a business trip in memphis so i was about eight years old. he asked me if i wanted to go. i said sure. i went with him to memphis in the middle of december. we went to the hotel. he had a long break in his day. he's in the hotel room and says, all right, riley, come down to the lobby with me. i think, ok, where are we going? i knew not to question this. i go down there with him. we go outside to where they had a standard hotel pool. it was covered with a tarp. my dad pulled back the edge of the tarp and says jump in. i look at him, i'm like dad, first of all, i'm eight years

old. i'm in my clothes at this point. i don't have a swimsuit. naturally, i did not pack a swimsuit. he says jump in and i will tell you when you can get out. here are the rules. you are not allowed to chatter your teeth, you are not allowed to shiver and not allowed to say i am cold. i'm looking at him like, dad, this is child abuse. i want to call mom, but that was not an option. i kind of trusted this without really questioning him, at least out loud. i knew this was crazy, but i jump in. i tread water for about five, 10 minutes. he's reinforcing with me, don't say you are called. finally, he lets me come up. i asked him what was that about? he says that was your first lesson in mental toughness. you know about physical toughness. you know hard work. you know the pain that you feel

when practicing and competing, but you have not learned how to be mentally tough. riley, that will take you so much further than physical toughness will ever take you. he said, understand, coldness is just a feeling. there is no such thing as being cold. it is all relative. there is such thing as absence of heat, but there's no such thing as cold. i still to this day, being 24 now, i think about that often. when i'm in pain or what have you, i think to myself this is a fleeting feeling. there's no such thing as this subjective concept like coldness, like my dad taught me. peter: did that lead to success in the pool? riley: definitely. it definitely did. that is not to say i didn't have days where i neglected that mindset. i certainly did. but, i think having that foundation, having parents who

instilled in me how to be both physically and mentally tough, how to think for myself, how to call out an injustice when i see it, all things that i attribute to wonderful parents. those things certainly contributed to my success as an athlete, but more importantly, as a person, as a christian. peter: riley gaines, give us a little bit of your success statistics. riley: in the pool, i very proudly finished my career, i was a seven-time tennessee state champion. in college, i was a 12 time ncaa all-american. five time sec champion. the sec recordholder in the 200 meter butterfly, making the one of the fastest americans of all time. i was the two-time olympic qualifier. the sec scholar athlete of the year. and sec community service leader

of the year. the list goes on. really just to reiterate, it is a lifelong journey to make it to that point and certainly one that i know would not have been possible without women's sports or without the women's sports category or title ix. peter: tenths of seconds matter in swimming, don't they? riley: hundreds of seconds. peter: your husband is also a swimmer, but unranked. could he beat you in the pool? riley: he could kick my butt in the pool. i don't tell him that often on really anything, but i digress here. even given the fact that in terms of accolades and national ranking and achievements, my achievements far outweighed his. i was on a full ride at kentucky. he was a walk on. even that being the case, he

could beat me without even trying, really. so, all of that to show you the differences between men and women. the drastic differences. peter: how did you get involved in the sports and transgender issue? riley: unfortunately, i got involved because i lived it. i was directly impacted by this movement. i will take you back a little bit. my junior year, i ended up placing seventh in the country in my 200 freestyle, which i was proud of. top eight, all-american. it was right then and there that i placed seventh my junior year that i set a goal for my senior year to win a national title which would mean becoming the fastest woman in the country in my respective event. so, senior year rolls around and i'm right on pace to achieve this goal. about midway through my senior season, i was ranked third in the season, trailing the girl in

second by a few 100ths of a second. a girl that i knew very well. the top-tier athletes know each other because you grow up competing against each other. but, the swimmer who was leading the nation by body lengths was a swimmer that none of us ever heard of before. not me, not myself, not my teammates, none of us. this is the first time we became aware of someone named leah thomas. a lot of red flags of the time. we didn't know who this person was. we have never seen this name before. for all i knew, this was a senior who came out of nowhere. yeah, like i said, senior year, from university of pennsylvania which is not a school that has ever historically produced that caliber of a swimmer. leading the nation by body lengths in the 100 freestyle all

the way to a mile. the mile is certainly long distance. none of it made sense. we continued to stay in the dark until an article came out disclosing that leah thomas is actually will thomas and swim three years at the men's team at the university of pennsylvania before deciding to switch to the women's team, where he at best in the men's category ranked 55 4th in the nation the year prior. to now, not just number one in the women's category, dominating the entire country, the entire nation of women. naively, i thought the ncaa would see it how i saw it and how my teammates thought and how my coaches thought. anyone with any amount of brain activity would probably comprehend this, but lo and behold, they did not. the ncaa saw nothing wrong with this.

about three weeks before the national championships in march 2022, they announced thomas' participation was nonnegotiable. meaning there was nothing we could do. there was no question that we could ask as female athletes, no concerns that we could raise. we were told we had to accept this with a smile on her face. peter: when did you first meet leah thomas? riley: so, the first time i encountered leah thomas was at the national championship. let me just say. i have had to -- i got to personally witness and really feel the effect that this infringement, or what i would call an injustice had on myself and my teammates and my competitors. look, i don't claim to speak for every single girl on that pool deck, of course not, but i do claim to speak for the overwhelming majority of us because i -- i can

wholeheartedly attest to the tears that i saw. not just from the moms at the stands watching as their daughters are being obliterated in the sport that they once loved, but the tears from the girls who placed ninth and 17th and missed out on being an all-american by one place. i can wholeheartedly attest to the extreme discomfort in the locker room. when you turn around and there is a 6'4", 22-year-old man fully intact and fully exposing himself, inches away were you were simultaneously undressing. i can wholeheartedly attest to the whispers, because that is what they were, they were whispers of anger and frustration from those girls who just like myself had worked our entire lives to get to this meet. so, that first day, he swam the 500 freestyle which is not an event i do. i watched on the side of the pool as he swam to a national

title to literally no one's surprise, beating out american record holders. these are not scrubs. they are the most impressive and accomplished female swimmers this world has ever seen and he beat them all by body lengths. the next day, he and i raced in the 200 freestyle which ultimately resulted in a tie. meaning we got on the blocks, we dove off, swam eight laps of the freestyle and gone the exact same time, down to the hundreth of a second, which is kind of embarrassing for a 6'4" man that he couldn't beat me. but two, it is rare. you are racing for a minute and 40-ish seconds and not even 1/100th separated us? you cannot tell me that is not divine intervention. we go behind the podium where the ncaa i official looks at us.

he says great job you two, but you tied. we only have one trophy, so we will give this trophy to leah. sorry, riley, you don't get one. when i asked the dreaded question of why? why are you adamant on giving this trophy to the man in the women's 200 free? what is the thought process here? i appreciated his honesty. he said this with a somber voice. his face changed, it visibly looked sad. he did not even believe what he was about to say, but he looked at me and said, riley, i am so sorry, but we have been advised as the organization that when photos are being taken, it is crucial that the photo is in leah's hands. you can pose with this one but you have to give yours back, leah takes the trophy home, you go home empty-handed and end of story. that is the defining moment for me of realizing that i could no

longer be complicit in this. and by being silent, by participating in the farce, i was being complicit. if i was not condemning this, i was condoning it. it may be just as bad as the people who created and enforced these policies. for so long, i waited. i waited for someone who i thought was supposed to be protecting us, to protect us. a coach, a parent, an ncaa official, someone with political power. it was in that moment that it hit me, this realization of how in the world could we as women, as female athletes expect someone to stand up for us if we weren't even willing to stand up for us? this has to come from us. again, as women, as female athletes. peter: what was the response from mark emmert, head of the ncaa at the time, or former

massachusetts governor charlie baker, the current head of the ncaa? riley: as you can imagine, because as it has become seemingly more common in virtually every realm, whether it is academia, corporate america, or our government, we are governed and led by weak-kneed, spineless, morally bankrupt cowards. and mark emmert and charlie baker fall into that category. the president at the time, mark emmert, in the days following the national championships where thomas was able to compete with the women, he released a statement. in this public statement, he said i unequivocally stand in my decision to allow leah thomas to swim with the women because it is based in evolving science. but privately, i see mark emmert at the ncaa women of the year award banquet, to which i was

nominated for, but ncaa women of the year was not limited or exclusive to just women because leah thomas was also nominated for this, the most prestigious award for collegiate female athletes. i see him there and mark emmert has the audacity to say you keep fighting, keep pushing. as if he's not the one that i am fighting. that is something that we have seen. i have seen it in the u.s. house, u.s. senate. unfortunately, this issue has become polarized in such a way where it has, again, in terms of our elected officials and the media, seemingly fallen on party lines. not representative of society at large. i have seen democrats, they have come up to me and said, look, i was an athlete. or i have a young daughter that plays sports, i totally agree with you. yet, when they have the

opportunity to highlight or to put on record that they agree with me, they fail every time. peter: in swimming against the current, riley gaines, you talk about being gas lighted or emotional blackmail. riley: yeah, that is something that we faced daily, really, from our universities, from administrators, and the way we were silenced. we were essentially forced into submission. we were coerced. our schools would tell us, you will never get a job if you speak up about this. your employer will look you up and see that you are a transphobe. you don't want that, do you? you are supposed to go to dental school to be a dentist after this. you will never get into grad school if you are grant school knows you spoke up about this. you will lose your friends, scholarship.

riley, speaking of that scholarship, remember, you signed that and when you signed that scholarship, you give away your rights to speak in your own personal capacity. remember who you represent because it is not yourself. no, you represent us. whose name is across your chest? it is not yours, it is ours, and we have taken your stance for you. i have to go to training, sensitivity training where they brought in an outside professional, whatever that means. they sat me down, a 21-year-old senior in college sat me down and taught me how to use she/her pronouns, like a mock interview setting. they would ask me interview questions. i had to answer the interview questions to their standard or else i had to go through the training until they were satisfied. that was not just my university. that is actually mild compared to what other universities faced and continue to face. but believe it or not, it is effective.

it works. when you are talking to a bunch of 18, 19, 20-year-old girls, some schools going as far to say you will have blood on your hands. you will be equivalent to a murderer because someone could take their own life and it would be your fault, and you don't want to be a murderer, do you? so, i suggest you be kind and be inclusive. that is what they told us daily, day in and day out. so, where it seems there are few people, few female athletes that have been impacted in the way that i was, who were willing to take a stand, my sympathy is getting thinner, but i do understand. i really understand where these athletes are coming from. why they fear speaking up because the threats and the risks are real. so, there's a lot more people like me, at least in terms of mindset and perspective on this issue, but they are terrified to say it. peter: in your book, you use birth pronouns throughout.

riley: what i would say is biologically correct pronouns. i think the idea -- look, i will say it took me a while to come to this conclusion because when i first started speaking out, i told myself, yes, i oppose this but i want to be respectful. i don't want to be mean or hurtful or blatantly disrespect anyone. but, i now realize that is not what respect is. it is not respectful to lie. that is not respect. that is not compassion that they constantly tout. that is deception, that is manipulation. that is participating in the farce. it is not beneficial to anyone. it is not beneficial to me, my teammates, or competitors, or to even the person that identifies as trans. it is furthering a lie.

that is what the entirety of the gender ideology movement is based upon, deception and insecurity, and telling you to believe that you are correct to feel as if you were born in the wrong body. what a terrible message to be sending to anyone. adults, minors. no, what we should be telling people in a way that embodies grace and truth is that they are perfect just the way they are. we hear the other side constantly tout body positivity and different things, but is it body positivity to be removing body parts, to be injecting yourself with hormones and different things, physically altering what god crafted you to be in his perfect image? so, i do know adhere to using pronouns that match one's sex, i think that is the most

respectful thing you can do. peter: from your book, you write "being a conservative is akin to being a white supremacy and holding christian beliefs has become synonymous to an intolerant homophobe." do you consider yourself to be a homophobe or transphobe? riley: no, it is what i am told all the time through social media and different things. people who can't get past the headlines. people who think i want to ban trans athletes from competing altogether. no, i don't want those things. i think every single person should compete in sports regardless of any identity factor. regardless of your sexual orientation or gender identity, race, religion or what have you. every single person should compete in sports, but compete where it is safe, number one, and fair, number two. we cannot prioritize inclusion over safety and fairness. people who are not willing to hear that out, to understand the

perspective of someone who has direct experience competing against a male, unfortunately, living the real effects, seeing the real effects in real-time of competing against a male, they will call you all kinds of names. i really haven't called them all. i have been called, of course, a transphobe, domestic terrorist, a fascist, a nazi. even a couple weeks ago, now, which if you can remember, the national organization of women. the leading feminist organization for the past, what, 60 or so years at this point. they released an article where they called me a white supremacist patriarchate. here, i am fighting for equal rights and they call me a patriarchist, whatever that even means.

you will get called every name under the sun, but i am able to be called those names with a smile on my face because i am so confident in my stance for objective truth for biological reality. it is very clear in the way that male and females are different. not in a way that makes one sex inferior to the other, no, but we are unique. it is really by design. it is beautiful in the ways we are different. we are meant to become lamentably of one another -- be complementary of one another and we should showcase based on those uniqueness and physical feelings. it is a hill i am willing to die on. yes, standing from the point of objective truth and biblical truth. god is very clear when creating male and female. peter: let's hear what martina navratilova had to say about this issue in 2022. >> leah, i don't agree that

should be allowed to swim, but she's going by the rules. the rules need to change. if i was a female swimmer, i really don't have a chance to be competing against leah. >> is the ncaa at fault? >> they kicked the can down the road. ncaa, all the governing bodies of sports, kick the can down the road, particularly ioc. the need to a better job, they need to get these scientists and experts in the field. this is how it needs to go, otherwise the controversy will continue. peter: riley gaines, have you spoken to martina navratilova about this issue? riley: i have had great lengths. her and i have some events coming up, even this next month where we will be together, urging the biden administration to reverse course on their illegal administrative rewrite of title ix. very excited for that.

this is someone who, she's a part of the lgb community. she's a lesbian herself. some would say she has done more for the lesbian community than any person on this planet even. even so, she recognizes that she would not have had the opportunities that she had, the success she had had men been afforded her roster spot, her titles. she knows that, as does any person who has a slight understanding of sports. even if you don't have an understanding of sports, you know intuitively that men and women are different. so, it is wonderful because in terms of the political landscape, some would say she's an unexpected ally. as i've said previously, this issue has become one that has been politicized and polarized, overly divisive in a way that does not represent society. the overwhelming majority of

society agrees this is wrong. but, nonetheless, she has become a friend of mine. she is someone who i look to for advice on this topic. she's been just wonderful. there are other things that we don't agree on. i would say a lot, a lot of other things we don't agree on at all, but that is the beauty of what it means to be an american, to live in the greatest country. we can disagree on things, certain things, but agree on others. and live in harmony, have civil discourse. encourage open thought and debate. that is what we do. we will go back and forth another topics, specifically even recently, harrison butker's commencement speech. she was not a fan of his message or intent. while there were some things that maybe i thing he could have done a better job of or understanding, i agreed with his

message. so, we went back and forth on that. at the end of the day, we still say we love each other and we are in this fight together. peter: biology is not bigotry, you write. a lot of this book is on the science of biology. riley: i can't even believe that we have to have a book that speaks to the science of men and women being different. but yes, a lot of it is -- some of these thresholds, testosterone thresholds, guidelines in place by governing bodies like the ncaa, like the ioc, other specific support governing bodies, they now say that if you have five liters of testosterone, you can compete in the category that best suits you. debunking that theory of women are more than just a

testosterone threshold. that is not what makes someone a woman, how much testosterone they have. debunking that theory. speaking to the biological factors at play in sports like swimming, other sports as well. why it matters. it sounds silly. i don't think a lot of people recognize this but even something as silly as men on average have a 40% larger throat than women. that is a huge factor in success in a sport like swimming. speaking to things like that, giving people things to consider that maybe they have not previously. peter: puberty is a game changer, you write, riley gaines. riley: it sure is. that is not what necessarily makes someone male or female, if they've gone through puberty or not. but once you have gone through puberty, a male going through puberty, the middle school, high school age range.

even speaking to my own experience and swimming, 11, 12 years old, relatively comparative to a lot of the boys in my age group. we would sit close to each other in practice, sometimes i would beat them at meets, sometimes they would be me. when we came back from summer of when we turned 13, 14, they grew taller, their bodies changed. they were much more defined. their muscles were. they were more explosive off the blocks, quicker off the turns. suddenly, i could not keep up with them anymore. i could not be them in a race. there's nothing that made me more mad than that. that was the reality of it. yeah, puberty certainly is a game changer and it is a reversible -- irreversible. we hear from the other side, especially the medication will side, you can just put a pause on puberty.

if you decide that transitioning is not for you, it will resume. no, puberty itself is irreversible, as are the effects of altering, trying to pause puberty. there's no such thing as pausing puberty or mother nature for that matter. peter: veronica iv is a transgender cyclist. she appeared on the daily show in 2022. here she is. >> one example i like to talk about is the 2016 rio olympics women high jump final. first place was over 6'3", 10th place was 5'5". 10.5 inch height difference between first and 10th in high jump. we call that fair. so, the range of body types within the female category is way, way bigger than anything that could be attributed to trans women. so, if there is an advantage, and i am not saying there is for trans women in women's sports,

it is not an unfair advantage. we have been trying to compete at the highest level for decades. we've been allowed to compete for decades and no one has won an elite world championship. no one has won an olympic gold medal. this tokyo olympics was the first time trans women even qualified for the olympics. this idea that trans women will suddenly take over women's sport is an irrational fear of trans women which is the dictionary definition of transphobia. peter: riley gaines. riley: so much to say here. first and foremost, are women only where the of equal opportunity -- worthy of people opportunity if we are competing at the highest level? if you are just playing for your middle school, high school basketball team, who cares if you lose? it is just women's high school basketball. that is a textbook definition of misogyny, veronica. so, that is to address that

point. secondly, i think for her to say that there are differences between females that exist, that genetic advantages like height, yes, of course. but, it is a mere decimal percentage as a performance -- as a performance gap. whereas, you take, for example, you have the world record holder in swimming in the women's 200 backstroke versus the world record holder in the men's 200 backstroke. you look at any event across any distance, any stroke, it is unanimously the men's world record is 10% to 12% faster than the women's world record. is it because women, we are not training as hard? is it because we don't have the

access to facilities or resources? no, of course not. 10% to 12% is a huge gap. michael phelps, he has longer limbs, more elasticity in his joints. that is a fraction of a decimal of an advantage over his next competitor. whereas, 10% to 12% margin, when you are fighting to shave nearly 100ths of a second off your time, that is a huge advantage that we cannot just overlook. peter: let's look at the flipside. let's say you wanted to transition to a male. should you be allowed to compete on the male side? riley: no, because the argument here is safety and fairness. i believe every single person is deserving of safety and fairness. so, we have seen a couple times women playing on a football team, being a kicker or something like that on a men's team. it alters the game.

it alters the competition aspect of the game because if i am a boy and there's a woman on the field and i was raised correctly, i don't want to tackle a woman at full speed, full force. the solution is what's always been in front of us. males compete with males, females compete with females. the last 52 years or so. that is not to say that i think co-ed teams are bad. if you advertise yourselves as a coed team or league, i think that is totally fine. people know what they are signing up for. i think transparency more than anything is what we are advocating for here. so, i think that is a solution to this. if you want to create coed teams, a coed league, by all means, people can sign up accordingly and know what they are getting themselves into. assess the risks and either agree or disagree to take on that risk. but, i think to blindly put people in a position where this

is not something that they agree to, whether it is playing on a team with a man or playing on a team with a female. again, i think it is wrong, it's harmful, and the effects are severe. peter: from your book, what does the biological effect of the two sexes matter in the arena of sports? it is the same reason why we have any category. the 12 and under group does not compete with 18-year-olds. able-bodied athletes do not compete in the paralympics. is it fatphobic that we don't allow heavyweight boxers to compete against featherweights? riley: right there. i encourage people to consider this perspective. any category was created on the occlusive rounds of ensuring in some way fairness or safety. that is why we don't have featherweights competing against heavyweights.

could you imagine someone like mike tyson fighting in a ring with a woman? could you imagine that? no way. it is because those categories exist for a legitimate reason, and it's not sexist to say it. it is not to say that women cannot compete with men because we are worse. no, of course not. we are capable and strong in our own right. even serena williams has set it. she said back in 2013, look, i don't want to play men's tennis. it is a totally different sport than women's tennis. it is not even the same sport. she went as far to say that i would get beat by a 600th-ranked male tennis player and she did get beat by a much worse ranked tennis player. a male ranked 203rd in the

nation plays both serena and venus williams, and they lost in a blowout. he was smoking and drinking in between sets. he played 18 holes of golf before and he still beat them. when he was not even trying. look at other factors in sports. we just watched the men's and women's basketball national championships. the three-point line is further back for men. the sheer amount of layups that you see in women's basketball when a player gets a fast-break compared to the amount of dunks you see when men get a fast-break. the size of the ball is different. in gymnastics, you have different events for men and women. men cannot do floor events. they do, but it is a different skill set that men possess over women. volleyball, men's net is 7.5 inches higher. baseball, the field is different

sizes. the fence is further back, the mound is further back. you are using a different sized ball. you are pitching different. you look at golf. the tee-off is different for males versus females. all to reiterate that biological advantages do exist and the categories are in place for a reason. peter: 1973, title ix, "no person in the united states shall on the basis of sex be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance." what is the importance of title ix in this transgender debate? riley: title ix, speaking to its importance, i could not do it justice. i don't think even i -- being

someone who has benefited from title ix, i don't think i could understand life before. when women were not given equal opportunities. when we were told we cannot compete. we were lesser as a sex and as a whole. the women who came before me who fought relentlessly so i can reap the benefits of title ix, i'm indebted to them. title ix taught me how to be a leader. it taught me how to set goals and work to achieve those goals. it gave me some of my best friends that will be my best friends for the rest of my life. it gave me my husband, for that matter. it's important -- its importance and necessity has been paramount for not just women, but humanity as a whole. transcending beyond athletics. i would say title ix propagated women forward in the workplace, within personal relationships. its implementation 52 years ago

is huge, to say the least. but now, title ix is under attack. actually, title ix has been abolished as we once knew it. those 37 words, you read the original title ix legislation enacted under president nixon. only 37 words with one word being activity that allowed title ix to be what its most notable for, equal opportunity in sports. we have been an administration in the white house right now who has actively rewritten title ix. changed it entirely. they took that 37 words in 1972 and they rewrote it to almost half a million words. 1577 pages long, from 37 words. that should tell you everything you need to know.

ultimately, equating sex with gender identity. meaning there are no protections for sex based discrimination anymore, at least on educational programs that receive federal funding. no, they were tech on the basis of gender identity. meaning men can use your locker rooms, bathrooms, changing spaces. they can take academic and athletic scholarships away from women. men can live in dorm rooms with women. your speech would be compelled. you are forced to use preferred pronouns. and if you don't, if you, a professor or student or your local ymca-goer, if you don't use preferred pronouns, then you are guilty and charged with sexual harassment under this new rewrite. not the man parading around your locker room. no, to president biden, that is considered brave and inspiring. you calling a spade a spade is grounds for sexual harassment. peter: you have testified

several times in front of congress. here's an exchange you have in december of 2023. >> it is disappointing to me that although the title of this hearing, a much needed discussion, we will likely be forced to listen to trans phobic bigotry. sports are a vital aspect of education that offers aborted lessons. athletics allows young people to engage in helping, movement and play. learn how to work as a team and form meaningful connections. i ask while we sit through this hearing and hear the hateful misinformation i am sure that will come our way, let us not forget that children are at the core of this issue. >> of course, there's a place for everyone regardless of gender identity, regardless of race or what sports you play. there's a place for everyone to play sports in this country, but unsafe, unfair and discriminatory practices against women must stop. inclusion must not by prioritized over safety and fairness. ranking member lee, if my

testimony makes me trans phobic, i believe your opening monologue makes you a misogynist. peter: riley gaines? was that ad-libbed at the end? riley: entirely. it did not even mean to say it. it just came out of my mouth. in true riley fashion. i will tell you in those brief moments, listening to -- whi ch is already unfathomable to me, that a 23-year-old swimmer has to go in front of d.c., the beating heart of the american republic and explain to them that men and women are different. and to be on the others of the stable and watch as they have these super confused looks on their faces. that is what i was there to do. the first words that came out of her mouth is i cannot believe i have to sit here and listen to

this transphobic bigotry. a sitting member of congress does not try to dissuade from my argument. no, instead resort to name-calling. so, i'm thinking to myself after i hear her say this, why is it that being pro-woman -- that is the stand i am taking. i am standing for something. what i am steady for is women. so, why is it being pro-woman is immediately deemed anti-trans? if that is the case, wouldn't being pro-trans be anti-woman? we call them a misogynist. that sent the hearing into a tailspin, as you can imagine. i don't think she's ever heard the word misogynist used in a

sentence, at least not accurately. her staff comes running over, they are pulling up their phones. looking things up. >> she raises her hand and says i want her words taken from the records. then it is like the jerry springer show and it is like my goodness but she is listed as a misogynist. >> another piece of video from cpac. trump: we have another great person here, gains, this is a

great champion. and she was beating everyone and then she said that is the largest human being i have ever seen. look at this, look at this. >> what happened there? >> in typical trump fashion i had no idea he was going to bring me on stage in front of thousands of people early on in my advocacy journey. i was not comfortable speaking in front of tons of people

alongside the former president, so i was shellshocked. he has been steadfast in understanding and fighting for the importance of male and female, the importance of women sports. i was able to grab dinner with him last week and he is in great form which is amazing. the energy for someone of his age is incredible. and so that was quite the experience for me. it was cool. it blows my mind. being able to stand alongside

the former president, having millions of followers for merely just saying that there are two sexes. and you cannot change your sex and each sex deserves equal opportunity. let that sink in, that is it. that is my message but for saying that the places you get to go is remarkable. it is remarkable. >> before we run out of time tell us about ajay gregory. >> aj is someone who helped me construct my thoughts, be able to highlight important parts of my message, my experience, my stories.

so she was instrumental in writing this book, helping me get my thoughts on paper. could not be more grateful for her and what a fun process to recount a lot of the different things that i had blocked out of my memory. it is hard to keep up and member all of the things going on but she did a great job. the book is more in-depth than what we got into. we could talk for days about different pieces of the pie, where we are going, what we can do, all things mentioned in the

book. host: this was recently from a college commencement. >> there was a petition with 1700 signatures to disinvited me from being the speaker. i ask you what are you so afraid of, having your perspectives challenged, engaging in independent thought? freedom should be cherished in a world where ideas are polarized. never underestimate the power of your voice. >> what happened while you were up there? >> so the president of adrian college took a huge chance.

this is a liberal arts college. in michigan. yet he invited me and when he reached out i was like did you mean to email me? i would love to do this, but i do not think you have the right person. he said free speech is our mission statement. the dignity of all people in the pursuit of truth and you embody that. so i was honored to deliver this commencement speech but as you can imagine there were a few people who did not appreciate my presence. many of them being professors. i did not know until afterwards but when i got on stage professors in the back draped themselves in trans flags and when i was done took it off in

cowardly fashion. i would have liked to engage in discourse but they were not willing to. i received a standing ovation from the students, the parents. i had multiple people say i'm going to donate to adrian college because i am so proud they invited you. that is the kind of school we need. it was a fantastic experience and adrian college president was beyond amazing to me and in their mission statement. >> the book is called swimming against the current in a world that has lost its mind. she has been our guest on c-span for the past hour. ♪

>> all q&a programs are available on our website or c-span now app. ♪