Paper Loses Longtime Columnist Over Trans Piece

Matt Calkins says he walked away from his job, and a specific unpublished column is why. The Hill reports that the longtime Seattle Times sports columnist announced on Thursday that he has resigned after the paper declined to run a piece built around two high school girls who objected to competing against transgender athletes in girls sports. In a Substack post, Calkins wrote that the column that argued supporting separate competition categories for "biological females and males" shouldn't automatically be labeled transphobic, "so let's stop throwing those labels around."

Calkins said it was one of several columns of his that the paper had killed, leaving him feeling he could no longer do his job. "When I take controversial stands that kind of go against the grain, spiked," Calkins, 44, who's been with the paper for nearly a dozen years, tells the New York Times. "Anything else is fine." The Seattle Times declined to comment "on personnel matters," per the Hill. The dispute unfolds as the WNBA wrestles with how to handle transgender participation, with player Sophie Cunningham and ex-NBA center Enes Kanter Freedom fueling a wider debate.