Trans athlete Sadie Schreiner alleges ban from Team USA track events amid quiet rule change to gender policy

Fox News

23-03-2025

Transgender track and field runner Sadie Schreiner posted a video on social media last Sunday claiming to have been banned from the US Track and Field (USATF) events at the USATF Maine Association Indoor Championships. The president of USATF Maine said Schreiner competed in the event and no disqualification occurred.
Schreiner recorded the video while sitting by a campfire in the woods, somberly suggesting the athlete had likely just competed in Schreiner's last organized track meet in the U.S.
"I very likely just ran what will be my last meet in the United States," Schreiner said, later adding, "I will find a way to keep competing, but I doubt that will be in the United States."
Schreiner said USATF changed its policy on transgender eligibility from the one used by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which allows biological males to compete in the women's category, to the one used by World Athletics, which bans any athlete who has undergone male puberty from competing as a woman.
The USATF's official transgender eligibility policy does now reference the World Athletics guidelines on its official webpage. It previously referenced the IOCs policy, as seen in an archive via Wayback Machine.
Schreiner alleges to have been told about the change by USATF at 1 a.m. the night before the competition.
"They tried to threaten me by saying they now adopted World Athletics transgender policy," Schreiner said in the video, later adding, "USA Track and Field purely did this just to ban me from competing."
USATF Maine president Mark Dennett told Fox News Digital that Schreiner competed at the event in Maine and no disqualification occurred.
"The athlete did compete and there were no disqualifications in the meet," Dennett said.
Fox News Digital has reached out to Schreiner for a response to Dennett's statement.
USATF's updated policy and Schreiner's alleged incident at the Maine Association Indoor Championships came weeks after a controversial appearance at the USATF Open Masters Championships on March 1.
There, Schreiner competed in the women's 400-meter dash and 200-meter dash, taking first place in both events.
Schreiner won the 400-meter dash by default, as the other participants in the event, Anna Vidolova and Amaris Hiatt, had no recorded times and are listed as DNS, did not start.
In the 200-meter dash, Schreiner defeated 14-year-old runner-up Zwange Edwards, 16-year-old third-place finisher Zariah Hargrove, 15-year-old Leah Walker and 18-year-old Ainsley Rausch. That event also had multiple participants listed as DNS, including 18-year-old Jordan Carr, 46-year-old Amanda Taylor, Vidolova again and 16-year-old Paula Damiens.
Schreiner's appearance and subsequent wins at that event prompted criticism on social media. Schreiner even suggested that incident is what prompted the recent change.
"USA Track and Field has silently banned trans athletes due to my participation," Shreiner said.
There has been an ongoing battle over trans inclusion in women's and girls' sports between the state government and President Donald Trump's administration.
On March 17, the Health and Human Services Office of Civil Rights (OCR) announced that it found the Maine Department of Education, the Maine Principals' Association and Greely High School in violation of Title IX for continuing to enable trans inclusion in girls' sports.
In the announcement, the department said Maine had 10 days to correct its policies through a signed agreement or risk referral to the U.S. Department of Justice for appropriate action.
The deadline to comply is coming up within the week.
Schreiner previously competed for Rochester Institute of Technology's (RIT) women's track and field team and gained national notoriety for dominating female opponents and frequent social media videos boasting about it as an openly transgender competitor.
However, Schreiner was ruled ineligible to compete for RIT after the NCAA revised its gender eligibility policy Feb. 6, one day after Trump signed an executive order to ban trans athletes from women's and girls' sports.
RIT provided a statement to Fox News Digital confirming this on Feb. 12.
"We continue to follow the NCAA participation policy for transgender student-athletes following the Trump administration's executive order. Sadie is not participating in the next meet," the statement said.
Later in February, Schreiner posted a video claiming the athlete's running speed became slower after taking medication to increase estrogen. Schreiner spoke of wanting to speak to policymakers at the NCAA to discuss the policy before it went into effect.
"They could have seen the results of their previous policy and how it made me equitable, but they didn't," Schreiner said. "And I would still love to have that conversation. I would still love to educate more people if I was properly allowed to."
Schreiner has been a controversial figure in women's track and field in the past year, especially after an appearance at the 2024 NCAA Division III Outdoor Track & Field Championships in May.
Earlier that month, Schreiner competed at the Liberty League Championship and won both the women's 200- and 400-meter, breaking the 400-meter record in the process. Schreiner would have finished last by more than two seconds in the men's competition.
In late January, Schreiner bragged after winning an event against female opponents.
"Not the race I was looking for at all this week, my spikes nearly fell off on the turn and with a poor start my time wasn't nearly what I wanted," the runner wrote in an Instagram post.
"The good news is that the season just started, and I'm going to leave everything on the track at nationals," Schreiner added with a transgender pride flag emoji.
On Jan. 17, Schreiner took first place in the 200- and 400-meter dashes at the Brockport Friday Night Rust Buster, taking top spots over two female seniors. In the 200-meter dash, Schreiner beat RIT teammate Caroline Hill by 1.5 seconds and took first place in the 400-meter dash from Brockport's Marissa Wise by nearly 3.5 seconds. Schreiner's results achieved automatic qualification for the All-Atlantic Regional Track and Field Championships.
On Jan. 24, Schreiner took first place in the 200-meter dash at the RIT Friday Meet, beating out Liberty League junior Lexi Rodriguez of Brockport with an even faster time. On Jan. 30, Schreiner took first place in the 200- and 400-meter dashes against Liberty League opponents.
Schreiner also spoke out against states and colleges that were not offering the trans athlete a full scholarship when Schreiner wanted to transfer in December. The athlete blamed laws in 25 states that prohibit trans athletes from competing with girls and women.
"Among all the hurdles transfers usually have, there is an extra layer because it is trans, 50% of the country banned me from participating and that meant I couldn't attend any of those colleges even if they reached out to me with a full ride," Schreiner said.
"It also became clear that states that did, no matter how adamant the coaches were to have me on their teams, the college administrations would usually stop them from allowing me to participate."
Follow Fox News Digital's sports coverage on X, and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter.