This story originally appeared on Them.
While speaking to reporters on Thursday, WNBA player Gabby Williams, who is currently a power forward for the Golden State Valkyries, said that she would welcome transgender players onto her team or any other in the league, adding a peaceful note to a contentious conversation around inclusion in professional sports.
“I think it’s trans, trans rights, right now, is our new battle,” Williams said in an interview with the Local W, a women’s sports outlet, that was then captured and shared on social media. She then added, “We see trans people’s rights being stripped away from them; there’s a lot of discourse around trans athletes and what they can compete in.”
She continued, “I would welcome a trans athlete on my team or against my team, anytime. I don’t think it’s a problem in the world. It’s just another way to kind of attack trans people. We’ve seen players like Layshia Clarendon, who stepped into that forefront, and have been brave enough, and courageous enough, to step up. So I guess that’s the next battle we have to fight as athletes.”
Clarendon, the WNBA’s first trans athlete, retired in 2024. They opened up about their gender identity in 2015 in an article in The Player’s Tribune in which they said they identify as “Black, gay, female, non-cisgender and Christian.” In 2021, they became the first WNBA player to have top surgery.
Williams’ comments come amid continuing headlines over Indiana Fever guard Sophie Cunningham airing her belief that trans women should not play in women’s sports while being profiled by ESPN.
“I got a lot of negative feedback about me hating trans. And I’m like, ‘I never once said that,’” she said earlier this year. “I think that I am here to extend love. But I also think with that love is truth, being honest. And I want to protect young girls in a locker room, or young girls in sport who shouldn’t have to go against biological men.”
Cunningham’s comments led to several transphobic rallies in support of her at her recent games, including one at the Climate Pledge Arena ahead of a July 28 away game between the Indiana Fever and the Seattle Storm.
Anti-trans protesters rallied both inside and outside the arena at the game; the outside protest numbered just a few dozen people, while two teenage courtside attendees held signs that said, “Thank you Sophie for speaking up for girls.” The girls’ seats, which were reportedly $1,300 each, were paid for by a “generous donor,” per right-wing influencer Brandi Kruse, who helped to organize the protest.
Cunningham’s anti-trans advocacy has also gained the attention of noted loser Riley Gaines, who has pivoted from getting fifth place in NCAA swimming races to palling around with President Trump and taking her anger against trans athletes out on trans youth. Gaines posted photos with Cunningham from a game against the Minnesota Lynx earlier this month.
At the same game that Gaines attended, Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve wore a “Trans Kids Belong” T-shirt, which some attendees perceived as a slight toward Cunningham. The two also exchanged words mid-court before the game started, though the chat was inaudible and Reeves later declined to share specifics of the conversation. Cunningham, too, declined to share specifics about the conversation, but did say that the two shared stories about their points of view.
“We left with love and respect and I think that’s what it’s all about,” Cunningham said after their exchange, per People.
Get the best of what’s queer. Sign up for Them’s newsletters.
