The debate over transgender athletes has now moved from the campaign trail to the Republican Congress, as the House of Representatives just passed a sweeping ban on transgender girls and women in sports, after Republicans spent an enormous amount of time and money running on the issue in last year's election. But one very important point in this debate is simply not being heard by most people -- the actual scope of the situation. Here is how the Washington Post started its article today on the bill moving through the House:

The House on Tuesday passed legislation banning transgender girls and women from competing in women's sports in elementary school through college, elevating an issue that Republicans pushed hard in campaigns last year to one of their first priorities in the new Congress.

What follows is a political breakdown of the vote, of the bill itself, of the Democratic position and the Republican position, and what the chances of the bill may be in the Senate. It's not until the very end that a few facts are begrudgingly tossed out, in the final paragraphs:

But trans athletes are rare. Last month, NCAA President Charlie Baker told a Senate panel there are fewer than 10 transgender athletes currently competing in college sports.

In K-12 sports, states that have released data show few, if any, transgender athletes. In Mississippi, a 2023 statewide survey of superintendents found that no trans students were participating in sports. In Florida, state records show two trans girls have played girls sports over the last decade. And in Utah, the governor said in a 2022 press release that of the 75,000 students playing sports there, just one was a transgender girl -- a 12-year-old swimmer.

One state, Ohio, reported that seven trans girls played sports during the 2023-2024 school year. But as in several other states, rules governed their participation: Each had to have taken a year of hormone therapy and prove, by way of "sound medical evidence," that she did not possess physical advantages.

Got that? In all of college sports there are fewer than 10 people at the heart of all this political uproar. This is an important point that is being completely ignored in the larger debate -- this "problem" isn't really all that big an issue at all. All of the time and energy being spent fighting over the issue is wildly disproportionate to the facts on the ground.

Of course, in today's political environment, facts don't matter nearly as much as they once did. Lies are perfectly acceptable, as far as Donald Trump (and his Republican followers) is concerned. Trump went further than just about anyone in demonizing transgender issues, stating falsely that children go off to school in the morning one gender, and then the school -- without the knowledge or permission of the parents -- performs sex-reassignment surgery on the child so that "he" comes home a "she." This is so unbelievably and viciously false on so many levels, but neither Trump nor his followers cared. He was allowed to repeat the lie time and again without anyone ever calling him on it -- which would have been pretty easy to do: "Can you name me one child that this has ever happened to? Because this just does not happen and has never happened in this country."

Republicans took Trump's lead and have scapegoated and demonized trans people in every way they can think up, most notably on the subject of trans kids and how schools should deal with them. This is part of a decades-long effort to scapegoat all L.G.B.T.Q. people, but ever since marriage equality was achieved for gay people this has been harder to do. Gay marriages have been happening everywhere for years now, and the sky simply has not fallen. It has become a normal part of life in this country (which is as it should be). So the GOP had to get more creative in their demonization.

Which led to trans kids and trans adults moving into the GOP spotlight. And from the amount of campaign ads they ran on it, they wanted every American parent to think that their child's school was being overrun by the "fad" of trans kids -- to the point where their own children would be "recruited" into this nefarious scheme (which is the same demonization they used against gay people, from the 1970s right up until gay marriage became legal).

The most effective aspect of this scapegoating so far has been the question of trans kids in women's sports. Because even some liberals who generally support trans people in other issues (such as bathroom choice or being able to receive the medical care they want) can see the question of a person who went through puberty as a male competing in women's sports as unfair. Which is precisely why this is the first issue the Republicans moved on in Congress -- because it has the widest support among the public.

Whether to allow trans people to use the bathroom of their preferred gender is seen by liberals as a question of discrimination. But questions of allowing trans people to compete in sports against opponents of their preferred gender is seen as a question of fairness. Which is why a lot more people support banning trans women from women's sports than they do the rest of the GOP's anti-trans agenda (the bathroom question and trying to ban all transgender medical care for both children and adults). Republicans know they've hit on a public-opinion winner with the sports issue, which is why it is now front and center.

Their bill, however, is so extreme that it only got two Democratic votes. It will need seven Democratic senators to vote for it to pass. In fact, one Democrat who has taken a lot of heat for speaking out on the issue after the election couldn't even bring himself to support it:

Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Massachusetts), who voted against the transgender athletics bill in 2023, said Democrats spend too much time "trying not to offend anyone."

He said in a statement Tuesday that he supports "reasonable restrictions" on transgender athletes in competitive sports but would vote no again on the blanket ban, which he called "too extreme."

"I've stated my belief that our party has failed to come to the table in good faith to debate an issue on which the vast majority of Americans believe we are out of touch," he said. "We should be able to discuss regulations for trans athletes in competitive sports, while still staunchly defending the rights of transgender Americans to simply exist without fear of danger or oppression. But instead, we've run away from the issue altogether. As a result, Republicans are in charge and continue to set the agenda with extremist bills like this."

The concept of trans women competing in sports is a complex and fairly new one, which means there isn't a definitive amount of scientific research to rely on when deciding who should be allowed to compete in women's sports. There is the question of puberty -- whether it has been medically blocked or suppressed, or whether puberty happened in a biologically male body before any transition even began. There is the question of testosterone levels in the bloodstream, and muscle mass. These, as I said, are complex medical issues that various sports organizations have been grappling with over the past few years. But there is no clear consensus yet, and no clear-cut guiding lines that everyone agrees must be followed.

Into this void step politicians eager to use the issue to divide their opponents. Republicans' main objective in all of this is to paint the Democratic Party as out of touch with the mainstream of America (parents, especially). That's why they spent so much money on all those campaign ads, after all. Now that they've won the trifecta of power (both houses of Congress and the White House), they're going to try to make good on all that fearmongering. They're starting with transgender athletes because it gets the highest level of support in polling of any of their anti-trans issues.

Throughout the whole political fight, however, let's not lose sight of one very important fact, though. In all of college sports -- from the major ones down to the minor ones very few people even know exist -- there are fewer than 10 transgender athletes competing. That is what Congress is spending its time regulating. It is an incredibly miniscule situation when compared to college sports as a whole. The issue has been blown far out of proportion to the actual numbers involved. Everyone should keep that in mind during the political debate, and news reports on that debate should feature this fact a lot more prominently, because it introduces some perspective that is badly needed.

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant