Amy Olson, a professional golfer who played in the LPGA, denounced the participation of Hailey Davidson, a man who claims to be a woman, in the LPGA Qualifying School.

Olson responded to video footage of Davidson playing at the LPGA Qualifying School and characterized his participation in the female golf league as unfair. “These women have worked too hard and too long to have to stand by and watch a man compete for and take their spot,” she contended. “The only fair path forward is a policy based on sex, not gender.”

Davidson must win two more golf events this year in order to qualify for the LPGA. He recently won the NXXT Women’s Classic, after which the league changed their policies such that only “a biological female at birth” can play against women. Davidson had ranked second in that league.

Davidson has criticized female golfers who voice concern with him playing golf with women. “I will never understand athletes who blame a transgender competitor on their own athletic failures,” he wrote on social media while practicing for the LPGA Qualifying School. “If you don’t take accountability for your failures then you will never actually be good enough to make it.”

The athlete played golf alongside other men at Wilmington University in Delaware before he started taking hormones in 2015 and underwent a so-called sex-change operation in 2021.

Davidson wrote in an opinion piece shortly afterward that he once thought he “had to choose between playing golf for a living and hiding who I was forever, or finally be happy as my authentic self and potentially never play golf again.” He revealed in the article that he had been in talks with the LPGA for five years before he underwent the so-called sex-change operation.

“Being the first in the world to do something has been such a great experience and with that, I want to do all I can to make sure that future athletes can finally see representation in sports,” he wrote in the article. “While I am playing for myself and to hopefully have a great career, I want to make sure that any platform I am given is used correctly to better the community.”