Volunteer-Run Website Behind Claim That Trans Athletes Took 2,293 Women's Titles: What We Know

The claim that transgender athletes have taken 2,293 women's titles in the United States, amplified by the US Department of Education on 24 September, traces back to a website run by anonymous volunteers that counts first-place finishes at every level of sport.

Concerned Women for America Legislative Action Committee (CWALAC), the legislative arm of the conservative Christian women's organisation, published the figure on 22 September, the day before a Senate hearing on women's sports. Its press release said 'trans-identifying males' had 'stolen over 2,293 gold medals' from women and girls, along with more than $501,498 (about £374,000) in professional prize money, across more than 14,301 female events since the mid-1980s.

'Congress must act to protect biological women,' said Penny Nance, the group's president and CEO.

The New York Post reported the figure the following evening. On 24 September, the Department of Education's official X account shared that report.

What Counts as One of the 2,293 Women's Titles

CWALAC's release does not define a gold medal, but HeCheated's rules set out what its data includes. The site includes every level of competition, from grassroots to professional, and its results page states that finishes logged as '1st (of 1)', where the athlete was the only competitor, are added to its first-place totals.

The release says the medals pushed 'each rightful champion down to second place.' HeCheated's About page says that in team sports, single-elimination tournaments, and most awards, it is 'impossible to know who may have won.'

The release says its data was compiled from HeCheated, which is a larger dataset. HeCheated's homepage lists 1,523 athletes and 6,900 first-place finishes across all countries, and its categories include athletes with differences of sex development (DSD) and males playing on female teams under rule exceptions. CWALAC has not published which US entries it counted or how it filtered them.

Trans writer and communications strategist Ari Drennen, author of the Substack newsletter The New Transsexual, examined a copy of HeCheated's results table archived on 25 September and published her findings on 29 September. She counted 3,798 US first-place entries for athletes the site labels trans-identified, more than CWALAC's total, and found no simple filter that reproduced its number.

Of those entries, 393 were marked '1st (of 1)', 1,040 came from Masters age-group events, and 933 from high school and middle school meets. Only 211 were professional. Drennen said she did not know whether CWALAC counted any of the single-entrant results.

The count has risen since CWALAC's July 2025 factsheet, which cited 1,941 gold medals across 10,067 events.

Who Is Behind HeCheated

HeCheated describes itself as 'an entirely volunteer effort' inspired by SheWon.org, an older database of female athletes who say they lost medals, podium places, or records to male competitors. HeCheated says it began in January 2024 with 50 athletes, went live that April, and now holds more than 20,000 data entries. Its website does not name the people who run it.

The site says it exists to 'influence policy' and to 'call out' the athletes it lists. It says it verifies whether an athlete is male through public declarations, school or job records, and 'visual evidence', which it defines as past photographs and media coverage. Its sources include news reports and social media posts, not all of which were archived.

The site also names 364 US high school and middle school competitors, according to Drennen. When Erin in the Morning raised the issue of minors in April 2025, an anonymous operator replied that 'all results are already publicly available including those for minors.'

Trans Athletes Debate Returns to Capitol Hill After Supreme Court Ruling

At the 23 September Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, chaired by Republican Chuck Grassley, senators heard from Independent Council on Women's Sports co-founder Kim Jones, former professional soccer player Carly Smolak, and attorney William Bock III. Democrats called no witnesses.

Ranking member Dick Durbin used his opening statement to warn against 'categorically treating every trans athlete, no matter their age or level of competition, as a threat to women's sports.'

Durbin also cited NCAA president Charlie Baker's December 2024 testimony to the same committee that he knew of fewer than 10 transgender athletes among 510,000 at NCAA schools. The NCAA limited women's competition to athletes assigned female at birth in February 2025, a day after President Donald Trump signed an executive order titled 'Keeping Men Out of Women's Sports.'

On 30 June, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 in West Virginia v. B.P.J. and Little v. Hecox that state laws limiting girls' and women's teams to biological females do not violate the Equal Protection Clause or, in B.P.J.'s case, Title IX. Twenty-seven states have such laws. The ruling does not require the rest to follow, and the Court said it was not deciding whether schools may allow transgender girls to play on girls' teams.

CWALAC is urging Congress to pass the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act, which would bar federally funded school athletic programmes from allowing males on women's and girls' teams. The bill passed the House in January 2025 but failed a Senate procedural vote that March.