Holding the NCAA Accountable with Sen. Josh Hawley
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Summary
Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Missouri) questions NCAA President Charlie Baker during a Senate Judiciary hearing. Senator Hawley questions Baker about women in the locker room, the policies that govern them, and why they should be allowed to swim with women.
Transcript
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Okay, only 10 more presents to wrap. You're almost at the finish line, but first...
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There, the last one. Enjoy a Coca-Cola for a pause that refreshes.
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Welcome back to the Gains for Girls podcast. We have a special guest this week. Earlier this week, there was a Senate Judiciary hearing surrounding name, image, and likeness.
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And on this hearing, they had President Charlie Baker. And when I say president, I mean the president of the NCAA. He was implemented back in March.
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And this was really his first time being under oath, publicly asked a lot of questions that I think deserve to be answered.
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And one, our guest today, Senator Josh Hawley from Missouri, he asked him those tough questions.
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He asked him about the locker room, the policies that are in place.
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And so super excited to have him on and couldn't be more grateful for his leadership and how he's willing and ready to stand with women.
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And so check out the interview with Senator Josh Hawley.
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I wanted to thank you for your line of questioning, for the questions that you asked, how you so thoughtfully pursued what you did.
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I wanted to just kind of really broadly ask you at first what you thought of his answers.
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And I'll tell you what I thought. First, I thought it was incredibly disingenuous.
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I was pretty unimpressed and I thought it was unsatisfactory.
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Well, I think you nailed it. And it's great to be on with you, Riley.
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And thank you for your incredible, bold stand for women, for sports and all of the above.
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It's amazing. And, yeah, you know, I thought to Charlie Baker, he hemmed and he hawed.
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I wasn't there. And then he said, you know, a bunch of mealy mouth.
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He wouldn't quite. So then I tried to nail him down and say, well, what's your policy now?
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Are you still forcing women to accept biological men in their locker rooms without their consent?
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And then he said, well, no, I mean, we probably wouldn't do it that way again.
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And, you know, I'm just like, listen, you're the head of the NCAA.
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What you did threatens the safety of women everywhere.
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And just tell us the truth. Are you doing it now or not?
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And the fact that, Riley, I mean, you know this better than everybody.
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But the fact that under oath, these guys cannot tell the truth and will not talk about it really, I think, says everything.
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Of course. And speaking of his predecessor, Mark Emmert, who is the president of the NCAA,
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I will never forget publicly after the week or so following that NCAA championships in 2022,
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again, where Thomas was allowed to compete in the women's category after three years of competing against the men being mediocre at best.
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We all know the story. The weeks following, Mark Emmert released a statement and it says word for word.
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It says, I unequivocally stand in my decision to allow Leah Thomas to swim with the women because it's based in evolving science,
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which I just think is comical to use those terms.
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But I say that to say I saw Mark Emmert at this conference where they were announcing NCAA woman of the year,
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which I was nominated for, which is the most it's the most prestigious honor for collegiate female athletes.
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But Leah Thomas was also nominated for NCAA woman of the year.
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But anyways, I see Mark Emmert at this conference.
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I approach him and he says, thank you for doing what you're doing.
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And the audacity to say that as if he's not the one we're fighting.
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I'll say when when there was a new president, Charlie Baker, he was, you know, put in place back in March is when he assumed his position.
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And I thought he was someone who considered all viewpoints and considered fairness and these these different aspects.
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And so going off that, Senator Lee asked a question and he said, you know, do has anyone apologized to Riley and the other female athletes who were at that meet?
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And he's, you know, well, same line of answering response, you know, well, I wasn't there, so I don't know.
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And I agree that it was totally cowardly to to not take that opportunity to ensue an apology.
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And so do you think he owes an apology and really to who?
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He owes an apology to you and to female athletes everywhere, but particularly those who the NCAA put into this position.
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I mean, your testimony to the Senate was so powerful because you laid it out.
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And that's why I read it to him when I didn't want him to wheeze.
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You forced a biological man into the women's locker room.
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You didn't tell them you didn't ask for their consent and you sure as heck didn't get their consent.
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So if you think that that was wrong and he now acts like, oh, well, maybe we made a mistake.
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And then the best thing would be we're not going to do it again.
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No more of this like, well, we defer to to the individual sports.
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And the policy should be that biological men are not in women's locker rooms.
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So the fact, once again, that these guys cannot just come up and give straight, honest answers
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And the other thing, Riley, is, as you know from experience, they resent being asked about it.
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It's almost as if, oh, how dare you ask me about this?
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Because they sure as heck didn't have any problem forcing you to have a man in your locker room.
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And like, but they don't like to be asked about it.
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I'm sure he was heavily coached on how to weasel out of any situation regarding that yesterday.
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And the thing that blows my mind, Charlie Baker has a daughter who's my age, who plays sports.
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And it's the same thing we see among both the U.S. House and the Senate.
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Well, actually, in the U.S. House, entirely falling on party lines of Democrats voting in
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opposition of protecting women's sports, which is ironic.
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It would be comical if there weren't real effects and if it wasn't reality.
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And so I guess my question is, do you do you think these people really think this?
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I mean, do you think especially the ones with young daughters like Charlie Baker?
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Do you think they really are OK with their daughters undressing in locker rooms with grown
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I suspect that if it were their daughters, then it'd be a different story.
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But, you know, they are they're certainly happy to vote for it.
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As you said, they're happy to go out there and talk as if it's a matter of justice.
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What I don't understand is, is why is it a matter of justice for women to have their sports
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I mean, we have we've heard all this talk for all these years about how we need to have
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parity in women's sports, which is absolutely true.
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We have Title IX, which is supposed to guarantee women access at the collegiate level and elsewhere
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They're saying that if you're a woman, you know, hey, sorry.
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I mean, you have to accept the men in the sport.
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And to your point, if you're not fine with it and you speak out, they come after you
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and they say that they call you every name of the book.
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I mean, so to me, either you are for women's sports and basic common sense or you're not.
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And I just go back to the fact they know that this is crazy stuff.
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That's why Charlie Baker didn't want to answer questions about it, because he knows it sounds
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insane to come out of your mouth like, yeah, I think it's fine to have biological men in
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a woman's locker room and force the women to change in front of them.
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So they should have the guts to defend it or change the policy.
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And that was something he mentioned yesterday was, you know, we care about the safety and
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We care about the safety and security of all of our student athletes.
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Well, speaking from experience, they certainly didn't care about our safety or our security
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or our privacy or dignity or equal opportunities.
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Of course, as you said, he responded with, well, we don't really I don't really know what
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That's how I took you know, we don't I don't think this is what we would use now in regard
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But that to me, it sounds like he doesn't know what the policy is.
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And so you took the initiative and you sent over a list of questions, seven, eight or
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And again, these questions were about the policies, both the ones that are already in
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place and the future of what these policies look like in the locker room, the competition
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aspect, even the silencing pieces from outside corporations and public opposition and different
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And so you included at the end, you said, I'll await your responses.
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And so I want you to know that I am also awaiting.
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Do we have any kind of timeline of when we would potentially expect an answer by?
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You know, I'm going to also, Riley, do this thing where we submit the questions.
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And because he testified in front of the Senate, we can give him written questions, which are
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just as if it's as if he's still under oath and he has to answer them.
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So they're going to be official questions for the record.
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His answers will go into the congressional record because, you know, no more weaseling
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And as you said yesterday, it was a lot of, oh, I don't know.
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Do you really think that there should be female sports?
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I mean, just answer us, yes or no, and tell us what you're doing to protect women.
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We're going to get these answers hopefully in the next few weeks.
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And I can assure you, as soon as we get them, we will put them out there.
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You should be able to sit there and read us in two minutes.
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But clearly the folks at the bureaucrats at the NCAA are just scared out of their minds
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I think while you're at it and sending him these questions, I think you should send him
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a copy of your new book, Manhood, The Masculine Virtue America Needs.
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I think it's something that every person, of course, every man needs to read.
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Because what we're seeing is we have weak leaders.
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We have spineless cowards with no backbone who are willing to throw their moral compass
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entirely out of the window if it means being seen as virtuous or kind or inclusive or compassionate
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But thank you for everything that you do and how you stand with women.
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Like I mentioned, I think Charlie Baker needs to learn a thing or two about manhood.
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Make sure to check us out anywhere where you get your podcasts.
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