
Female fencer who took a knee rather than face trans athlete recalls ‘betrayal' by sport's boss: ‘I cried the whole night'
A female fencer who was disqualified from a tournament after refusing to compete against a transgender opponent told members of Congress Wednesday she 'felt betrayed' by the sport's governing body, who she said had 'defrauded' her and 'sold a lie.'
Stephanie Turner, 31, took a knee instead of fencing against Redmond Sullivan, a 20-year-old who was born biologically male, at USA Fencing's Cherry Blossom Open in Maryland on March 30.
In addition to forfeiting the match, Turner was hit with a 12-month probation period, causing her to step away from the sport.
Advertisement
The night before the scheduled match against Sullivan, Turner recalled to the House DOGE subcommittee, 'I cried the whole night and again felt betrayed by USA Fencing.'
'I had already spent the money on competition fees and new equipment, and spent hours training and refurbishing my equipment,' she explained. 'I felt trapped. I had been defrauded of a women's tournament and sold a lie by USA Fencing.'
'I had felt so isolated and strangled by USA Fencing for disagreeing with this transgender policy that I felt scared to speak openly, online, or with friends in the fencing community.'
Advertisement
USA Fencing Chair Damien Lehfeldt, who claimed in an August 2023 blog post that 'transgender women are women and gender is not sex' said that he hopes Turner reconsiders her time away from fencing — but declined to apologize when prompted by Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC).
5 Payton McNabb was previously a guest at President Trump's speech to Congress in March.
AP
'Miss Turner … remains free to enter tournaments and free to compete,' he said.
Lehfeldt also argued that concerns over transgender athletes in fencing are moot because USA Fencing also puts on mixed gender competitions — even though the event in which Turner and Sullivan were matched was specifically for women and not mixed-gender.
Advertisement
Turner accused USA Fencing of being 'unbelievably demeaning' by attributing female losses to transgender competitors to a 'skill issue.'
'Within the USA Fencing authoritative body, there is a culture of intimidation towards women which demands that we be silent when men enter our tournaments,' she added. 'A culture that includes public humiliation, doxxing, social ostracization, dismissal and even threats.'
GOP lawmakers on the panel took turns showering praise on Turner and her fellow witness, former volleyball player Payton McNabb, for their 'bravery,' while delivering stern rebukes of Lehfeldt.
5 Stephanie Turner ripped into USA Fencing's treatment of her concerns about transgender competition.
AFP via Getty Images
Advertisement
'Female athletes should never be forced to compete against mentally ill, biological men who parade around in women's clothes,' subcommittee chairwoman Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) stressed during the hearing.
'No one is here today to harm transgenders,' she added. 'We are here to defend girls and women, and we are here to defend Title IV and to uphold President Trump's executive order that all biological males stay out of girls and women's sports.'
McNabb was knocked out during a high school volleyball game three years ago after a transgender rival spiked a ball in her face — and recounted feeling 'helpless' when she found out a biological male was being allowed to compete.
5 USA Fencing board director Damien Lehfeldt had been an outspoken defender of the sport organization's transgender policies.
Getty Images
'Neither my team nor the administration agreed that we should be playing against a male,' she said. 'But the game went on.'
Since her initial injury, McNabb has suffered a concussion, vision problems and partial paralysis, among other health ailments.
'It is completely aggravating because the injury I suffered was 100% avoidable if only my rights as a female athlete had been more important than a man's feelings,' said McNabb, who is now an ambassador for the Independent Women's Forum.
5 Stephanie Turner dished on the anguish she went through when she decided to protest against a transgender rival.
AFP via Getty Images
Advertisement
Meanwhile Democrats repeatedly tried to undercut the hearing and needle Republicans for have the DOGE panel look into transgenderism.
'We're not even gonna call it the DOGE subcommittee anymore. This is called the Fencing Oversight Committee,' Melanie Stansbury (D-NM), the top Democrat on the panel, chided at one point after unsuccessfully trying to adjourn the hearing early.
At the end of the hearing, Stansbury acknowledged Turner's and McNabb's experiences, but declined to call for women's sports to be protected.
'I am genuinely sorry to hear that both of our young lady witnesses who are here today had horrible experiences,' she said. 'And I want to acknowledge that … but I don't need a bunch of GOP, Republican colleagues mansplaining at me for three hours.'
Advertisement
Democrats brought Fatima Goss Graves, president and CEO of the National Women's Law Center, as their chief witness.
When pressed about the physical differences between men and women by House Republican Conference Chairwoman Lisa McClain (R-Mich.), Goss Graves downplayed the distinctions.
5 The DOGE subcommittee hearing on female sports devolved into a bitter, partisan slugfest.
Getty Images
'I think where you're trying to go is, is there an inherent … difference between men and women in all contexts? And the answer is no,' she said during a tense exchange.
Advertisement
Mace, who like McClain was granted permission to join the hearing despite not being on the panel, also grilled Goss Graves.
'Mrs. Goss Graves, do women have penises,' a stern-looking Mace asked, with her glasses perched halfway down her nose. 'Should young girls just get used to penises in their locker rooms and showers?'
After getting cut off from answering, Goss Graces shot back, 'You don't even know what you're talking about.'
Mace later chided, 'That's what you all are — groomers.'
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
28 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Legislature to repeal MinnesotaCare for undocumented adults
Demonstrators gather for a protest organized by the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee calling for the continuation of MinnesotaCare for undocumented adults at the Minnesota State Capitol Tuesday, May 27, 2025. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer) Despite Democratic-Farmer-Labor control of the state Senate, the governor's office, and half of the House, Republicans forced Democrats to roll back one of their signature accomplishments from the 2023 legislative session: health care for undocumented people. The Legislature is expected to vote Monday to repeal undocumented adults' eligibility for MinnesotaCare, the state-subsidized health insurance program for the working poor. Children would still be covered. Republicans successfully used their leverage — the threat of a government shutdown starting July 1 — to force the Democrats' hand on an issue that is of supreme importance to GOP lawmakers. The DFL pulled out all nearly of the stops to avoid cutting health care access for undocumented adults. During negotiations, DFL leaders offered Republicans concessions related to paid leave, earned sick and safe time, and noncompete agreements — but Republicans didn't budge, said Sen. Alice Mann, DFL-Edina. 'They turned all of those things down, because all they wanted…was to make sure that the 17,000 people were left out to die, that we worsen our health care system and that we decrease our tax revenue,' Mann said at a press conference Monday decrying the move. When Gov. Tim Walz and legislative leaders announced a budget deal — contingent on repealing MinnesotaCare eligibility for undocumented adults — on May 15, lawmakers with the People of Color Indigenous Caucus protested outside the door. They told reporters later that they were blindsided by the deal. After the announcement, POCI caucus members brought alternatives to legislative leaders, said Rep. Liish Kozlowski, DFL-Duluth. The POCI caucus suggested capping undocumented enrollment in MinnesotaCare, raising premiums, allowing children currently enrolled to retain coverage instead of aging out, or making exceptions for elderly people or those with chronic conditions. None of those options made it into the bill, which is expected to be heard first on the House floor during a 21-hour special session beginning at 10 a.m. Republicans have repeatedly exaggerated the cost of providing health care to undocumented people enrolled in MinnesotaCare. Enrollment has exceeded the state's expectations, however, with more than 17,000 undocumented people currently enrolled. Meanwhile, per-person spending on the undocumented population has been lower than expected, according to the Department of Human Services. Federal politics and funding have complicated the issue: A budget bill passed by the GOP-controlled U.S. House would cut funding to states that provide health care to undocumented people, including Minnesota. And while the federal government pays for some of the cost of MinnesotaCare, it doesn't contribute any money for undocumented enrollees. Walz is expected to sign the bill into law.
Yahoo
28 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Democrats have a dirty secret - they actually like some of the tax cuts in Trump's ‘big beautiful bill'
Some of the sweeping tax cuts proposed in President Donald Trump's massive spending package have found support among Democrats — even as they are expected to oppose the legislation over proposed cuts to Medicaid and other government services when it comes up for debate in the Senate later this month, according to a new report. The gargantuan budget package, which House Republicans and the White House have dubbed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, passed the House by a single vote last month and is now drawing heat from fiscal hawks in both chambers as well as Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who was fresh off his months-long stint as a special government employee when he began threatening to back challengers to any legislator who votes for the bill. Still, there are facets of the proposal that have appeal for some Democrats, the New York Times reports. Virginia Rep. Don Beyer, a Democrat who is also a wealthy car dealership owner, told the Times his party is 'in general very much in favor of reducing taxes on working people and the working poor' when asked about Trump's plan to end taxes on service workers' tips. 'Those people are living on tips,' he added. Trump's tip tax cut plan has also attracted attention from Sen. Jacky Rosen of Nevada, a state where service workers make up a large and powerful voting bloc that has traditionally supported Democrats but shifted to Trump in large numbers during the 2024 presidential election, handing him the Silver State's electoral votes. Rosen, a Democrat, took to the Senate floor last month to advance a bill approving Trump's 'no tax on tips' plan. It passed unanimously even though the measure was largely symbolic because the U.S. constitution requires tax laws to originate in the House 'I am not afraid to embrace a good idea, wherever it comes from,'. she said at the time in remarks on the Senate floor. Yet despite the support for some of the individual tax provisions in the plan, it's highly unlikely that it will be able to muster enough if any Democrats to ease the way to Trump's desk, even under a Senate procedure known as budget reconciliation, which fast-tracks some types of spending legislation without subjecting it to the upper chamber's de facto 60-vote threshold for passage. Democrats are expected to unanimously vote against the legislation in the upper chamber, where it has also attracted opposition from some Republicans who've complained that the cuts to spending in the package don't go far enough to offset the reduced revenue caused by provisions meant to enact Trump campaign promises to end taxes on tips for service workers, as well as taxes on overtime pay for hourly workers and on social security benefits for seniors. Nonpartisan experts such as those at the Congressional Budget Office have warned that the reduced tax receipts would blow a massive hole in the federal budget and jeopardize America's long-term fiscal outlook, but that hasn't stopped some prominent Democrats from getting behind the individuals tax cuts. Trump and his allies hope the prominent tax cut proposals will blunt Democrats' efforts to paint the One Big Beautiful Bill Act as a giveaway to wealthy GOP donors that will gut government services while only providing limited relief for working-class voters. To that end, the president and others in his camp have routinely taken to social media to argue that anyone who votes against the bill is effectively voting for tax increases because the legislation makes permanent a number of temporary tax cuts enacted in the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which Trump signed into law during his first term. Democrats, meanwhile, remain opposed to the bill's massive cuts to Medicare and other measures that make it harder for people to claim tax credits meant to boost lower-income Americans' bottom lines. Rep. Brad Schneider, an Illnois Democrat, told the Times that the whole bill had to be considered rather than any individual provision or provisiosn. 'Any one thing — a tax credit or a tax cut — might make sense, but you've got to take a look at the whole picture,' he said.


E&E News
28 minutes ago
- E&E News
Committee explores nuclear solutions to AI demand
House Science, Space and Technology Committee lawmakers will meet this week to discuss how nuclear energy could help meet a projected surge in demand from artificial intelligence operations. The Energy Subcommittee hearing — to be led by Chair Randy Weber (R-Texas) — continues Republicans' early focus and significant concern regarding supply and demand in the 119th Congress. They believe baseload energy sources, such as nuclear and fossil fuels, need to be built at a rapid pace to offset a surge in intermittent, renewable energy generation that could put grid reliability at risk. Indeed, transmission providers are forecasting an 8.2 percent growth in electricity load over the next five years primarily due to AI data center proliferation. That's equivalent to hooking up nearly 50 million homes to the grid by 2029. Advertisement But whether nuclear energy can actually meet that demand remains a point of debate among energy and policy experts.