<p>WASHINGTON—A special administration task force formed by President Donald Trump has launched investigations into the University of Maryland and Wagner College after they failed to protect a female athlete penalized for refusing to compete against a male who identifies as a female, The Daily Wire can first report.</p>
<p>The <span class="m_3272313139753942338normaltextrun">Title IX Special Investigations Team — a joint Education Department and Justice Department project — launched a directed investigation Monday into the University of Maryland over allegations that it not only allowed a male athlete to compete in the women&#8217;s category of the USA Fencing Tournament, but also allowed that male athlete to use women&#8217;s-only intimate facilities. </span></p>
<p>The Special Investigations Team is also investigating Wagner College for its own practices and polices that allegedly allowed that male to compete in female sports and to use female intimate spaces.</p>
<p>Both colleges received letters from the Title IX Special Investigations Team on Monday, The Daily Wire has learned.</p>
<p><strong>READ THE LETTERS TO THE <a href="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/04/OCR-_University_of_Maryland_Directed_Investigation_NL-PII-Redacted-1.pdf">UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND</a> AND <a href="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/04/OCR-_Wagner_College_Directed_Investigation_NL-PII-Redacted.pdf">WAGNER COLLEGE</a></strong></p>
<p>Officials black-carded and booted 31-year-old Stephanie Turner from a tournament at the University of Maryland for refusing to compete against Redmond Sullivan, a male who identifies as a woman and who formerly competed against males. USA Fencing allowed Sullivan, who competes for Wagner College, to compete in the women’s tournament, the organization <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/video-female-fencer-booted-from-tournament-after-refusing-to-compete-against-male-opponent?topStoryPosition=undefined" target="_blank" rel="noopener">confirmed</a> to The Daily Wire.</p>
<p>&#8220;<span class="m_-4452834139253449014xxnormaltextrun">The nation watched as a female competitor bravely took a knee and forfeited an inherently unfair fencing match after discovering that her opponent was a male,&#8221; Education Department spokeswoman Julie Hartman told The Daily Wire. &#8220;No woman should have to recuse herself from a match that she trained diligently for because she fears for her safety.</span></p>
<p><span class="m_-4452834139253449014xxnormaltextrun">&#8220;As a tournament host, University of Maryland has a responsibility to follow Title IX by not allowing males to compete in female competitions and occupy female-only intimate facilities,&#8221; Hartman said. &#8220;Similarly, Wagner College has a responsibility to not allow males on female rosters.&#8221;</span></p>
<p>The University of Maryland had a responsibility to follow Title IX by not allowing men to compete in female competitions or be in women&#8217;s spaces, the Education Department is alleging, arguing that Wagner College also had a responsibility to protect female sports from males.</p>
<p><span class="m_-4452834139253449014xxnormaltextrun">&#8220;Unlike the Biden administration, which weaponized Title IX contrary to its meaning to deny female athletes their civil rights, the Trump Administration’s Department of Education and the Department of Justice’s Title IX Special Investigations Team will not allow recipients of federal funding to deny women’s equal opportunity protections under the law,&#8221; Hartman said. </span></p>
<div id="attachment_907415" style="width: 875px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/exclusive-trump-launches-investigation-into-colleges-over-transgender-fencing-scandal/president-trump-signs-no-men-in-womens-sports-executive-order-3" rel="attachment wp-att-907415"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-907415" class="wp-image-907415 size-large" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/04/GettyImages-2197857257-865x576.jpg" alt="" width="865" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/04/GettyImages-2197857257-865x576.jpg 865w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/04/GettyImages-2197857257-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/04/GettyImages-2197857257-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/04/GettyImages-2197857257.jpg 1024w" sizes=" (max-width: 865px) 100vw, 865px" /></a><p id="caption-attachment-907415" class="wp-caption-text">Trump signs the “Keeping Men Out of Women&#8217;s Sports” executive order (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)</p></div>
<p>“I want to thank God for trusting me with this mission to fight for female exclusive sports and putting me in a place to effectively protest,” Turner told The Daily Wire in a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/female-fencer-speaks-out-after-shes-expelled-for-protesting-male-opponent">statement in early April</a>. During the competition, she took a knee and forfeited the match to her male opponent.</p>
<p>About a week after the incident, Wagner College <a href="https://nypost.com/2025/04/09/sports/transgender-fencer-at-center-of-controversy-after-female-opponent-refused-to-compete-no-longer-on-womens-team/?itm_source=parsely-api#!">confirmed to Fox News Digital</a> that the male athlete is no longer on its women&#8217;s team.</p>
<p>The Trump administration created the <span class="m_3272313139753942338normaltextrun">Title IX Special Investigations Team after receiving</span> a “staggering volume” of Title IX complaints. Both the Education and Justice Departments have been vocal about Title IX situations in California, Maine, and other states.</p>
<p>The agencies repeatedly point to Trump&#8217;s executive orders protecting female student athletes from <span class="m_3272313139753942338normaltextrun">having “to compete with or against or having to appear unclothed before males,&#8221; as well as Trump&#8217;s order &#8220;Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism.&#8221; </span></p>
<p>“Under the Biden administration, Title IX was weaponized contrary to its meaning to deny<i> </i>women their equal opportunity protections under the law,” Hartman <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-admin-forms-special-investigations-team-to-probe-men-stealing-womens-opportunities?author=Mary+Margaret+Olohan&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=3&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Trump+Admin+Forms+%E2%80%98Special+Investigations+Team%E2%80%99+To+Probe+Men+Stealing+Women%E2%80%99s+Opportunities">told The Daily Wire earlier this month</a>. “Schools allowed male competitors to strip female athletes of their rightful accolades, threaten women’s safety, and subject them to the indignity of unfair competitions.”</p>
<p>“In America, this is the women’s rights issue of our time,&#8221; she added. &#8220;And the Trump administration will fight relentlessly to protect them.&#8221;</p>

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EXCLUSIVE: Trump Launches Investigation Into Colleges Over Transgender Fencing Scandal