Legal group warns WNBA over fan speech restrictions in transgender debate

The Alliance Defending Freedom, a legal organization that has won two recent Supreme Court victories defending state laws protecting women's sports, sent a formal letter to WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert on Friday. The warning came after two separate incidents at WNBA games in which fans expressing support for women's sports exclusivity said they were confronted, silenced, or forced to leave.

The first confrontation happened on July 28 at Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle during an Indiana Fever game against the Seattle Storm. Two teenage girls sat courtside wearing XX-XY Athletics shirts—merchandise associated with Sophie Cunningham, a player who had publicly opposed transgender athletes competing in women's sports. They held signs thanking Cunningham for speaking out. Celeste Keaton, a minority owner of the Storm, approached the girls and berated them with profanity, according to the family. One girl was left in tears. The WNBA later fined Keaton and suspended her from five home games; the Storm issued an apology saying all attendees deserved to feel welcome.

Then, on August 16, nearly three weeks later, a nearly identical situation unfolded in Atlanta. Kasey Thomason and her teenage daughter Annie wore XX-XY Athletics shirts to a Fever game against the Atlanta Dream. During overtime, WNBA security personnel told them to remove the shirts or leave the arena. A third fan wearing a shirt supporting transgender rights was also ordered to cover it. The WNBA acknowledged the next day that security had acted improperly and should not have restricted the fans' clothing. The Atlanta Dream said its own employees were not involved in the decision.

Suzanne Beecher, legal counsel for the Alliance Defending Freedom, told Fox News Digital that the incidents raise serious constitutional questions. She pointed out that if WNBA facilities receive any public funding, First Amendment protections could apply. "There could be cases here," she said. When asked whether civil liberties were violated, Beecher was direct: "Absolutely. The fans should be able to go and be respected in voicing their viewpoints." She emphasized that the league's failure to prevent a second incident after apologizing for the first one showed the WNBA had not gone far enough.

Beecher acknowledged that sports leagues can impose reasonable limits on how fans express themselves—but those restrictions must be applied equally regardless of which side of the transgender-athlete debate a fan supports. "It can't be that one side of the argument is silenced while the other side is amplified," she said. The ADF is calling on the WNBA to establish clearer policies, train employees and security personnel consistently, and define its player-eligibility rules. The league's collective bargaining agreement states that "only players who are women are eligible to play in the WNBA," but it does not specify whether eligibility is based on biological sex or gender identity. Commissioner Engelbert recently announced that a task force of team presidents and general managers would continue discussing the question.

Engelbert responded to the controversy on Thursday, saying people were attempting to use the league to "sow divisiveness" and turn it into a "political football." She also criticized what she called "haters" targeting the league. Beecher said the ADF would prefer to work with the WNBA to resolve the issues rather than pursue litigation immediately. "The preferred path would be to have this be a stepping off stone for the WNBA to make sure that going forward they're really respecting the rights of all fans," she said. No lawsuit has been filed, but the legal warning signals that the organization is prepared to escalate if the league does not address the pattern of fan restrictions.