I-638 doesn't only bar transgender girls from girls' school sports. It requires every girl in Washington, K through 12, who wants to play a girls' sport to get a doctor's signed statement certifying her biological sex. The doctor must base it on her reproductive anatomy, her genes, or her testosterone level. Boys don't have to certify anything. Today's sports physicals don't check any of this. Want to keep the current rules? Vote NO. Ballots are due by 8 p.m. on November 3.
Let me start with the obvious, the same way I did with 645. If you have a daughter, a granddaughter or a niece who plays soccer, and you're voting yes, here is what you're voting for. Before she can play, a doctor has to certify she is female, based on her anatomy, her genes or her hormones. Her brother, signing up for the boys' team the same afternoon, gets nothing of the kind. That isn't my spin. It's what the text says. Male athletes are exempt from the verification process.
I know that's not what most yes voters think they're voting for. Most of them are picturing a teenage boy towering over a field of fifteen-year-old girls, and that picture isn't crazy. I'll get to it, because it deserves a straight answer. But the measure on your ballot reaches a lot further than that picture.
Here's what it would mean for ordinary families. Every girl who wants to play a girls' sport needs a provider's statement verifying her biological sex. Under the text, the provider can rely only on her reproductive anatomy, her genetic makeup, or her naturally produced testosterone. Practically, that means one of three things: an exam, a genetic test, or a blood test. The state PTA argues insurance is unlikely to cover the two lab options, so for many girls the realistic route would be an intimate exam with no medical purpose, possibly starting in middle school and possibly repeated.
Then there are kids whose bodies don't fit neatly into a form. Doctors routinely see delayed puberty, hormonal variation and intersex traits, where anatomy, hormones and genetics don't line up neatly. The initiative doesn't say what a doctor is supposed to sign for those girls. Neither does anything else.
And, of course, transgender girls would be out. That's the point of the measure. You can think that's right or wrong, but it's the part that gets said out loud. The rest mostly doesn't.
If you want to read the measure, and please do, it's two pages: https://www2.sos.wa.gov/_assets/elections/initiatives/finaltext_3276.pdf. Ballotpedia has a summary and a list of who's for and against: https://ballotpedia.org/Washington_Sex_Verification_Requirements_for_Female_School_Sports_Initiative_(2026)
Same deal as last time. I'm not neutral, and you can tell. Below are the claims I see shared most, with the fact that answers each one and a link so you can check it yourself. Some links go to supporters' own sites. The point isn't to tell you how to vote. It's to help you turn a worry into a question with an answer you can verify. If you read it all and still vote yes, at least you'll know what you're voting for. That counts.
"Congress already passed this in 2025. Washington is just catching up with federal law."
This is false. When Let's Go Washington launched the initiative, Skagit County Republicans told supporters it aligned with the federal Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act, which they said passed in 2025 and bans transgender girls from girls' sports in federally funded schools.
It didn't pass. The House approved it in January 2025. On March 3, 2025, the Senate fell short of the 60 votes needed to move forward, 51-45, and it never became law. What exists is a presidential executive order, which is not the same thing as an act of Congress, and isn't what they said.
This one matters because "it's already the law" is the kind of line that makes people stop thinking. Before you vote, it should make you start.
Read it yourself: the Skagit GOP post, https://skagitrepublicans.com/node/2781; CBS News on the Senate vote, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/senate-democrats-block-bill-ban-transgender-students-girls-sports; the bill's official history, https://fastdemocracy.com/bill/us/119/bills/USB00089663
"Nothing new. Sports physicals already verify sex."
This one is false, and it's written into the initiative itself. The text claims students already get a physical that documents their sex assigned at birth, and calls that a reliable, medically verified basis. It isn't. The state PTA points out that the WIAA's own forms contradict it. Sex appears only on a history form that the student and parent fill in before the visit. That form is self-reported, and it never goes to the school.
The doctors' side of the paperwork records height, weight, blood pressure and vision, plus a general review of body systems. Nothing about sex.
Ask a doctor. One physician who volunteered at mass physical events in medical school said they had no capacity for blood draws and never did genital exams. Another said a blood test wouldn't be done and a pelvic exam is never part of a sports physical.
A political mailer fight this month repeated the same idea from the other direction: a conservative outlet said the measure just relies on existing physicals, which already confirm an athlete's sex. Same claim, same answer. They don't.
Read it yourself: the WSPTA analysis, https://www.wastatepta.org/washington-state-pta-opposes-initiative-il26-638/; the Yakima Herald-Republic, https://www.yakimaherald.com/news/northwest/washington-voters-to-see-ballot-initiative-aimed-at-trans-girls-in-sports/article_87027ee9-4ba6-5fd0-8239-64db962efa33.html; and the Seattle Red piece making the claim, https://seattlered.com/politics/i-638-pac-mailer-girls-sports-lies
"There's no exam. A doctor just signs a form."
Half true, which makes it the trickiest one. A Herald columnist who supports the measure says no school official or coach inspects anyone; a doctor signs a form. That part is accurate. Heywood himself says the measure was written so only girls and their doctors are involved.
But the doctor can't just sign. The doctor has to base the signature on anatomy, genetics or testosterone, nothing else. A letter-writer in the Lynnwood Times quoted those exact three bases, and in the same letter insisted the initiative doesn't require any physical exam. Read those three bases again. One of them is an exam. The other two are lab tests nobody is offering to pay for.
The doctor's signature is the last step, not the whole process.
Read it yourself: the Welch column, https://www.heraldnet.com/2026/08/01/welch-638-does-what-critics-say-it-cant-protect-girls-without-banning-anyone/; the Lynnwood Times letter, https://lynnwoodtimes.com/2026/10/27/il26-638/; and once more, the text, https://www2.sos.wa.gov/_assets/elections/initiatives/finaltext_3276.pdf
"Her birth certificate settles it" / "It's just checking a box."
False. The initiative doesn't accept a birth certificate, and it doesn't accept a checkbox. Anatomy, genes or testosterone. That's the list.
"Trans girls are taking over girls' sports in Washington."
Nobody knows how many transgender girls play girls' school sports here. The WIAA doesn't keep a count, and neither campaign has cited a specific number. Some numbers floating around are not even from school sports. The case Let's Go Washington highlights most, a girl who placed second behind a transgender runner in a 1,600-meter race, happened at a 2024 Junior Olympics event in Cashmere, which is a club event, not a school one.
But I promised black and white without hiding the grey, so here's the grey. This month in Camas, about a dozen girls on a high school cross-country team forfeited a race rather than run against a transgender student who switched from the boys' team mid-season. The student had finished 76th in a boys' race, then won a varsity girls' meet and placed second in two others. (That's from conservative outlets citing Outkick. Local coverage confirms the protest.)
That case is real, and those girls' frustration is real. If it bothers you, I'm not going to tell you it shouldn't. What I'd ask is whether one case, or a handful, justifies requiring every girl in the state to be medically certified. That's the actual question on the ballot.
Read it yourself: KOMO on the missing numbers, https://komonews.com/news/local/washington-voters-initiative-i-638-girls-sports-transgender-student-athletes-no-biological-males-sex-verification-reproductive-anatomy-november-election-ballot; MyNorthwest on Camas, https://mynorthwest.com/local/camas-girls-sports-initiative/4286526; the Daily Signal's account, https://dailysignal.com/2026/10/15/washington-high-school-girls-refuse-race-against-male-cross-country-runner
"The Supreme Court already decided this, and most states agree."
Partly true, and it's worth getting right. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that Title IX allows schools to field separate teams defined by biological sex. Allows, not requires. Washington law has let students play on teams matching their gender identity since 2007, and nothing in that ruling forces it to change. As for the other half, 27 states have adopted sex-verification rules for school sports. If I-638 passes, Washington would be the 28th. That's a real trend, not a lie. It's also not a reason, on its own.
My side has stretched things too.
Some No messaging says girls could be examined in group settings in gyms. The initiative doesn't say that, and supporters are right to mock it. The more honest version of the worry: lots of kids get physicals at mass events because they don't have a regular doctor, and those events can't do blood draws or genital exams. The text also requires the statement to come from the girl's "personal" provider. So kids without a regular doctor have a real problem, just not the one in the ad.
"Girls as young as 8" is in the No statement in the voters' pamphlet. The measure covers K-12, so the age isn't invented. But very few 8-year-olds play interscholastic sports, and putting it front and center is more alarm than information.
And "witch hunt" is a feeling, not a fact. I understand the feeling. It doesn't belong in a fact check.
Why push the false versions? Some people believe them. Some don't need to. This measure is financed mainly by one hedge fund manager; Heywood had personally put $1.62 million into the PAC by January. Speakers at an early rally said winning in Washington could give advocates a path in other blue states. That doesn't make every supporter cynical. Most of them aren't. It just tells you this ballot fight is bigger than one school district's track team.
The honest case for yes is this. Frances Staudt, a Tumwater senior who plays three sports, said she sat out a basketball game against a team with a transgender player. She said boys are built differently, that she worries about injuries and locker rooms, and that one trans athlete affects a whole team of girls. Plenty of people find that persuasive, including some who usually vote with me. It's a real argument about fairness and safety. It's just not the same thing as the 2025 federal law that doesn't exist or the sports physical that doesn't do what the initiative says.
YES enacts I-638. NO keeps the current rules. Ballots go in a drop box by 8 p.m. on November 3, or in the mail with that day's postmark.
