New Details Emerge About Saga of California High School Trans Athletes Suddenly Being Investigated by Trump Admin

Following the landmark January 13 Supreme Court hearing on trans athletes in women’s sports, the U.S. Department of Education (ED) announced 19 new investigations into educational entities suspected of violating Title IX.

The Jurupa Unified School District (JUSD) in Riverside, California, was at the top of the investigations that the ED announced on January 14. The second entity on the list was the neighboring district, the Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District (PYLUSD). Their destinies became intertwined amid a national controversy involving a trans athlete in 2025.

News Digital obtained exclusive details related to the incidents under investigation, through a public records request, and testimonies from the young women who were impacted. News Digital is not revealing the name of the trans athlete in this specific story at the request of the athlete’s mother when we reached out for comment. However, the mother and the athlete have previously spoken publicly and the athlete’s name is widely disseminated and known.

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A young life changed forever

Former Jurupa Valley High School girls volleyball player Hadeel Hazameh spoke out in the fall about playing with a transgender teammate for the past three years, joining a lawsuit against her school district over it.

The experience has been very traumatizing and difficult to overcome. Hazameh accelerated his academic studies to graduate early and not have to share the same halls as his antagonists. His last day of school was December 19. He will no longer compete in track and field this spring.

“I really wanted to do athletics… I really miss volleyball,” Hazameh told News Digital.

Hazameh walked away from his volleyball team in protest in early September, about a week before officially filing a lawsuit. Hazameh said she always believed men should not compete in women’s sports, but also cited her religious beliefs, as a practicing Muslim. He couldn’t be in the same changing spaces as a biological man.

Then came the reaction. Hazameh said her volleyball teammates, except the co-plaintiff in the lawsuit, Alyssa McPherson, turned on her.

“After I went public that I didn’t support biological men in women’s sports, of course, not everyone likes me anymore. The only friend I have is Alyssa. And that’s okay, honestly. I don’t need a lot of friends, I just need the ones that are there to support me,” Hazameh said.

The treatment of his classmates even resulted in an alleged death threat from a classmate, who Hazameh said was reported to the school without response.

“People are very disrespectful. I’ve been getting very disrespectful comments, I’m walking to class and someone curses at me, or I’m pretty sure someone almost told me to die. And I reported it to the school and they didn’t do anything about it,” she added.

“‘They said to me, ‘What do you want me to do for you in this situation?’ And I said, ‘someone just told me to die.’ Are you serious right now?'”

Hazameh added: “I thought this is a repetitive cycle with this same girl and I have seen no consequences. And yes, it was formally reported. I handed over the yellow receipt and sent it to one of the receptionists,” and that she eventually presented a second receipt alleging the problems.

Jurupa Valley High School was inadvertently thrust into the national spotlight last May when President Donald Trump called out a situation involving a trans athlete at the school competing for the women’s track team. The trans athlete advanced to the state finals, prompting Trump to send out a Truth Social post warning state officials not to allow the athlete to compete in the event.

On the last day of May, the trans athlete from Jurupa won state gold in the high jump and triple jump, and finished second in the long jump.

Then Trump’s Justice Department filed a Title IX lawsuit against the state in July for refusing to keep biological males out of women’s sports.

As the fall sports season began again, the trans athlete from Jurupa returned for a fourth and final year of women’s volleyball.

But the 2025 season would not go so well. In addition to Hazameh and McPherson’s protest and lawsuit, opposing teams began losing, presumably in response to the sudden national awareness surrounding the trans athlete. At the end of the regular season, at least 10 games were lost from the schedule.

Jurupa Valley High School and other schools that oversaw the losing teams began publicly confirming that games would not be played.

A national media storm had reached the high school of 1,638 students.

Newsom’s office intervened

In early September, a representative from Governor Gavin Newsom’s office contacted JUSD administrators, referencing California’s ongoing legal battle against Trump over the issue of trans athletes in women’s sports, as seen in public records obtained by News Digital.

Newsom’s Legal Secretary, David Sapp, sent an email to district administrators on Sept. 8 that appeared to include a copy of the state’s motion to dismiss a lawsuit, filed by Trump’s Justice Department in July, over CIF’s continued policies allowing men to participate in girls’ sports.

“As discussed, I am attaching a copy of the motion to dismiss that we filed on Friday in the USDOJ’s Title IX lawsuit,” Sapp’s email wrote.

The email was forwarded by a district administrator to others, to be discussed at a meeting on September 12. The exchange also seemed to indicate that school administrators recently discussed the issue with Sapp himself.

“You can let the team know that [JUSD administrator] “I received this from David Sapp of the Governor’s office on Monday when we discussed the issue with them and will pass it on in case it is helpful to our discussion today,” the email wrote.

News Digital requested minutes and transcripts of the Sept. 12 meeting referenced in the JUSD administrator’s email. The school district responded by stating it had no records it could share of the meeting.

“The September 12 meeting attended by [JUSD administrator] It was an informal teleconference, which included, among other attendees, the District’s legal counsel. There were no minutes of the teleconference, and [JUSD administrator] I didn’t take notes or create any documents,” a JUSD administrator told News Digital.

“Any notes or documents prepared by the district’s legal counsel have not been shared with any other party and, as such, are covered by the attorney-client employment privilege and the attorney work product doctrine.”

JUSD and Newsom’s office have declined to provide more clarity on interactions between Sapp and the school district.

INSIDE THE SCOTUS HEARING WILL BE A INVISION POINT IN THE CULTURAL WAR OVER TRANS ATHLETES IN WOMEN’S SPORTS

A source within Newsom’s office provided a statement, in background, to News Digital in response to a request for clarification about Sapp’s interaction with JUSD administrators.

“On September 8, 2025, [JUSD] Superintendent [Trenton] Hansen and Dave Sapp discussed the USDOJ lawsuit mentioned in their email, which includes allegations related to Jurupa USD. Dave followed up to share a copy of the State’s Motion to Dismiss, which had been filed the previous week and was otherwise publicly available. “Dave did not provide the district with any directives or suggestions regarding its handling of the transgender athlete situation or related interactions with the media,” the statement read.

The school district began consciously ignoring media inquiries.

JUSD administrators maintained a spreadsheet documenting media coverage of their volleyball situation, keeping track of the online stories that were written and any correspondence with the journalists who wrote them.

For the first 27 stories, published from August 8 to September 4, the spreadsheet indicates either a statement was provided or no request was made. The district provided responses to 10 different stories, plus an on-air interview for News affiliate KCAL and an in-person interview for The Press Enterprise.

Then, on Sept. 6, for the first time, the district wrote on the spreadsheet that it decided not to respond to an inquiry. It was for a News Digital story about Hazameh and McPherson stepping away from the team.

From Sept. 6 to Jan. 14, the spreadsheet recorded 15 stories in which the district stated it decided not to respond to an inquiry. Outlets that did not receive responses include OutKick, News Digital, The Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post and Newsweek.

A Sept. 20 email from a school spokesperson to a fellow administrator said, “I think I can ignore this one?” while submitting an inquiry about seizures from News Digital.

“FYI… I am ignoring this,” a school spokesperson wrote in an email to another administrator, referring a media inquiry about the seizures to a reporter for The Christian Post on Oct. 20.

A Sept. 25 email from KNews2 and KCAL9 News asking about the seizures was forwarded between administrators, with one of them writing: “Update: You also left a voicemail wanting to confirm the seizure. I plan to ignore it.”

An Oct. 15 email said, “I think we made the right decision by not responding,” while forwarding a News Digital article about one of the reported seizures. The school did not respond to six inquiries about that particular story, as noted in the spreadsheet.

Jurupa administrators even talked among themselves about confiscations that Jurupa refused to verify to the press. A Sept. 17 email between administrators referenced three losses by three rival teams during a weekend tournament. One email said, “They were at the Roosevelt Tournament this weekend,” while sending a news article about the three losses.

“There were several teams that canceled but they were less public because it was during the tournament,” another email wrote in the thread.

JUSD confirmed to News Digital a late September seizure against Patriot High School, a school in its own district.

The spreadsheet indicates that the district only responded to two inquiries total after Sept. 6, one to confirm the loss of Patriot to News Digital and the other to confirm the same to The Press Enterprise.

Aside from those two cases, JUSD did not respond to any other inquiries after Sept. 6, according to the spreadsheet.

The regular season came to an end in October. Jurupa Val Law finished tied for first place in the River Valley League and headed to the CIF playoffs.

That’s when their paths would cross with students at PYLUSD, the other district near the top of the Trump administration’s recent list of new Title IX investigation targets.

the last dance

In May 2025, the PYLUSD board considered a resolution to limit women’s sports to “biological females,” but it failed on a 3-2 vote because, as a school district representative noted, “board resolutions cannot override state law.”

Then in October, a school within the PYLUSD, Valencia High School, faced off against Jurupa Valley for the first round of the girls volleyball state playoffs.

The Valencian team chose to play the match. But two Valencia players did not take the field that night.

The parents of two Valencia players who decided not to play that night previously provided a joint statement, according to the parents, written by the two girls, to News Digital on condition of anonymity.

“On October 18, our team was informed that we would be playing Jurupa Valley High School in CIF Round 1. While scouting the team, we quickly realized that they had a transgender player that we would be competing against on October 22. Ten other teams had previously lost to Jurupa, which alarmed our team and led us to consider whether or not we should play,” the statement begins.

“Due to our beliefs and values, we decided not to participate and not attend our CIF (California Interscholastic Federation) first round game. We believe that allowing men to participate in women’s sports is unfair, creates safety concerns, and goes against our faith. We value fair competition and integrity in volleyball, and our hope is to continue playing the sport we love without having to be in a position where we know the situation is wrong.”

The two girls continued to cite their Christian faith as a reason for not playing and insisted that their actions were not directly directed at the trans athlete.

“As Christians, our decision not to participate in this game was not difficult to make, but it was uncomfortable to be the only ones to do so. We chose not only not to participate in the game, but also not to attend the game, as a way of showing our stance and our disagreement. Our goal was not to point out [the trans athlete]”but to express our belief that biological males should not compete in women’s sports,” the statement continued.

“Our decision was not made out of hatred or discrimination towards anyone, but rather out of our belief in justice and faith. We hope that the integrity of women’s sports is honored and preserved.”

Valencia won the playoff match, ending Jurupa Valley’s season and seemingly ending the trans player’s high school volleyball career.

Hazameh and McPherson were in the stands that night. They were joined by a crowd of local ‘Save Girls’ Sports’ protesters, led by prominent activist and former NCAA women’s soccer player Sophia Lorey.

But protest was not Hazameh and McPherson’s first choice. They wanted to sit with their teammates on the team bench.

Hazameh and McPherson previously told News Digital that their girls’ volleyball coach ordered them to let him know in advance if they wanted to sit with their teammates on the bench for games. The girls claim they told their coach they wanted to sit with their teammates for the playoff game against Valencia, but they were not given permission.

An Oct. 27 email sent by the Jurupa Valley High School assistant principal to Hazameh’s mother, Hanan Hazameh, addressed the mother’s concerns about Hadeel not being able to sit on the bench with his teammates.

“After reviewing the matter, I confirmed that [the coach] not instructed [redacted] or any other player who was required to ask permission to sit on the bench during volleyball games. Regarding your concern about the CIF game, I confirmed that [redacted] He was not allowed to sit on the bench,” the email said.

“Your email request about sitting on the bench was sent at 5:18 pm. During that time, I was driving to Valencia High School and did not have access to my email. I did not see the message until later that night, as I was assisting with supervision during the game to help ensure the event ran smoothly and safely. If you had called me earlier in the day, we could have discussed your concerns before the game.”

So the two teens spent the game with the “Save Girls’ Sports” protesters, who welcomed them with open arms.

It was a tense night. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, re-shared an X-ray photo of two California residents appearing to make malicious gestures toward Hazameh and McPherson.

“If you do this to girls, your heart has gone completely dark,” Cruz wrote.

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As Hazameh looks toward a future without sports, he will look to continue his education and is a member of California’s movement to fight for Title IX.

It didn’t start like that. It wasn’t his plan. I wanted to play volleyball and run track. But California policies put her in the same locker room with a biological man for nearly four years and forced her to this point.

And her story is just one of many in California and the country involving girls who have been affected by such cases.

As the Trump administration continues to crack down on the issue, other girls like Hazameh, McPherson and others can only watch and hope for reconciliation.

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