GOP Missouri Congresswoman Cheered, Condemned For Ad Saying ‘Women’s Sports Are For Women’ | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's Note: This post appears here courtesy of the The Daily Wire. The author of this post is Hank Berrien.

    A Missouri GOP Congresswoman running for the Senate seat currently held by Republican Senator Roy Blunt, who is retiring, released a campaign ad in which she targeted biological men competing in women's sports, calling them "Men pretending to be women."

    Rep. Vicky Hartzler started her campaign ad by referencing Lia Thomas, the University of Pennsylvania biological man who has precipitated an uproar by competing on the women's swimming team. Hartzler stated, "Meet William Thomas - ranked number 462 in men's swimming. Meet Lia Thomas - ranked number one in women's swimming. Only one problem, it's the same person."

    "Some people are afraid to talk about it," she continued. "Not me. I'm Vicky Hartzler, I ran and coached girls' track, and I won't look away while woke liberals destroy women's sports. Women's sports are for women. Not men pretending to be women."

    "The six-figure advertisement is set to run in the Show-Me State from February 21 through March 18, according to Politico, coinciding with NCAA winter championships," The Daily Mail reported.

    Some on social media both condemned Hartzler. One said, "'Some people are afraid to be transphobic and spread hate speech, but not me. I'm Vicky Hartzler and I'm an awful human.'"

    Others responded with memes saying, "Go f*** yourself," and "I'll leave you to your bulls***."

    But others cheered her with comments like "Thanks for speaking up on this, and with such clear language #SaveWomensSports," and "Thank you - from all of us sport playing/loving women & girls."

    "Well, I will certainly support you for this alone!," another added.

    In early February, 16 members of the Penn Women's Swimming and Diving Team sent a letter to the University of Pennsylvania and the Ivy League asking them to refrain from suing the NCAA over its new Athlete Inclusion Policies that would bar Lia Thomas, formerly known as Will Thomas, from participating in the NCAA championships in March. They stated, "We have been told that if we spoke out against her inclusion into women's competitions, that we would be removed from the team or that we would never get a job offer."

    "The group, organized by three-time Olympic gold medalist Nancy Hogshead-Makar, sent the letter early Thursday morning asking UPenn and the Ivy League to support us as biological women' and not engage the NCAA in legal action in an effort to challenge the new protocols," Swim Swam reported, adding, "Hogshead-Makar says that the swimmers wrote the letter themselves, though both Hogshead-Makar, an organized group of parents, and other athletes, made edits before arriving at the final draft."

    In the letter, the swimmers note, "Biologically, Lia holds an unfair advantage over competition in the women's category, as evidenced by her rankings that have bounced from #462 as a male to #1 as a female. If she (Thomas) were to be eligible to compete against us, she could now break Penn, Ivy, and NCAA Women's Swimming records; feats she could never have done as a male athlete."

    They continued:

    Most important to us is that Lia's inclusion with unfair biological advantages means that we have lost competitive opportunities. Some of us have lost records. But even those that swim different events than Lia or were not in contention to make the Ivy Championships, we stand by our teammates who have lost out. It has often felt like Penn, our school, our league, and the NCAA did not support us.

    We have dedicated our lives to swimming. Most of us started the same time Lia did, as pre-teens. We have trained up to 20 hours a week, swimming miles, running and lifting weights. To be sidelined or beaten by someone competing with the strength, height, and lung capacity advantages that can only come with male puberty has been exceedingly difficult.

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