As RedState’s Jerry Wilson reported, WNBA star Sophie Cunningham gained a new fan when the Indiana Fever shooting guard recently came out in defense of women and girls and said she believes they should not be playing against biological males.
Cunningham’s stand moved 16-year-old Washington state high school athlete Ahnaleigh Wilson, who has experienced the issue firsthand, so when the Fever came to town to take on the Seattle Storm on Tuesday, Ahnaleigh and a friend decided to attend. They carried signs that said things like, “Thank you Sophie for speaking up for girls.”
For that, they were verbally abused as Storm co-owner Celeste Keaton came over and called them "f***ing insane." The unhinged Keaton was suspended for five games by the league and the Storm issued an apology, but as Jennifer Oliver O'Connell reported, it was weak sauce indeed.
Now Ahnaleigh is speaking out, and it’s heartbreaking to hear what leftist adults in this world have done to the young lady. She had to compete against boys four times in the last school year, she lost a regional championship race to a dude cosplaying as a female in May 2024, and now she’s getting sworn at in public by a rich AWFL.
Do these people have any shame? I guess there’s an obvious answer to that question, as you will see when you hear Ahnaleigh’s story, which she shared with Fox News on Friday.
Ahnaleigh Wilson, the young Sophie Cunningham fan at the center of a national controversy after an encounter with a Seattle Storm co-owner, breaks her silence after the co-owner's suspension.
— Jackson Thompson (@JackThompsonFOX) July 31, 2026
Ahnaleigh and her family claim no one from the Storm or WNBA has reached out yet to… pic.twitter.com/591eGeKubQ
Ahnaleigh Wilson, the young Sophie Cunningham fan at the center of a national controversy after an encounter with a Seattle Storm co-owner, breaks her silence after the co-owner's suspension.
Ahnaleigh and her family claim no one from the Storm or WNBA has reached out yet to apologize to them, as they have had to navigate unwanted attention and backlash. The incident was especially personal to Ahnaleigh as she lost a big competition to a "male" in 2024.
RELATED: WNBA Team's 'Apology' Somehow Forgot the Girls It Was Supposed to Be For
I Bought a Pair of the Sophie Cunningham Basketball Shoes, and I Don't Even Like Basketball VIP
The girls were just enjoying the game when Keaton suddenly turned up and started cussing them out. Does it feel good to a grown woman to make a young girl cry?
"After she was done, she kind of just walked away, and me and my friend were just like, 'What just happened?' Um, we were kind of stunned. I was like, "I'm not gonna cry, not gonna cry." Um, but I feel like I kind of cry, I don't know, when I feel overwhelmed or anything, honestly. So I started crying a little, and I was kind of embarrassed, 'cause I really didn't want to," Wilson added.
She had good reason to feel like crying, given what she’s endured at the hands of leftists who claim to fight for women’s rights even as they actively work to destroy them.
The emotional response was in part because of how personal the issue of protecting girls' sports is for Wilson. Washington is one of the 19 states in the U.S. that actively protects the rights of males to compete in girls' sports. So in eighth grade, she and her family said she lost a regional championship race to a biological male trans athlete in May 2024.
Wilson had to work her way back from a knee injury to compete in that race, and had the lead, up until the final lap, before the trans athlete zoomed past her and took first place. Wilson also said she had to compete against a male athlete four times this past school year in cross country.
Like Cunningham, Ahnaleigh isn’t hateful toward people who want to live differently; she just thinks fairness and safety need to be accounted for too.
"Those people don’t know me, and they don’t know that I love everyone," she said. "I don’t have an issue with people being trans. It’s just that it’s unfair when it comes to sports."
This is Celeste Keaton, and she's exactly what you’d expect:
This is Celeste Keaton: pic.twitter.com/mvh26a0rtf
— Andy Ngo (@MrAndyNgo) July 29, 2026
As Rusty Weiss reported, Cunningham herself entered the chat and stood up for the brave girls Wednesday.
I truly believe there is a safe space and love for EVERYBODY. Biological girls, biological boys, trans women, and trans men. Everyone is welcome at my table! You can disagree and still be kind.
— Sophie Cunningham (@sophaller) July 30, 2026
Bravo to those girls for standing up for what they believe. You’ll be hearing from… https://t.co/gIVWhEHi3Q
I truly believe there is a safe space and love for EVERYBODY. Biological girls, biological boys, trans women, and trans men. Everyone is welcome at my table! You can disagree and still be kind.
Bravo to those girls for standing up for what they believe. You’ll be hearing from me soon💕 yay for gifts.
Truly embarrassing of the co-owner. Unfortunately shows the type of leader she is.
To all the folks like Olympic gymnastics star Simone Biles and Democratic Socialist Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY-14), who mock people such as women’s rights advocate and former swim star Riley Gaines and Ahnaleigh Wilson for speaking out on the issue, are you comfortable with a girl losing trophies to males and getting trashed in public by wild-eyed, vicious leftists?
If Biles, AOC, and others like them don’t publicly apologize and stand up for Ahnaleigh, they’ll be showing once again that "progressive" ideology comes before everything — even the rights and treatment of their fellow women.
