All-American, all-female swim star Riley Gaines makes no bones about what America is up against in its present 'spiritual battle': 'I've looked that evil in the eyes'

All-American, all-female swim star Riley Gaines made a name for herself in college athletics but refused to rest on her laurels. Instead, the 23-year-old used the momentum she first gained in the water to launch a personal defense of truth and fairness.

For having sought to keep men out of women's sports and for having refused to accept delusions as facts, she has been attacked, both physically and verbally.

Gaines recently made clear that there is far more to this battle than flesh and bone — that "this is a spiritual battle" in which her Christian faith has armored her.

Within hours of providing deranged leftist Keith Olbermann with a reality check, Gaines told the titular host of "Higher Ground with Billy Hallowell" on the Aug. 30 episode of his show that she has "always been spiritual," even though this critical aspect of her life is rarely brought up in the media, certainly not "in the minute and a half you're on Fox News or wherever you're talking."

"I grew up in the church. I'm very fortunate to have that firm foundation, but I will tell you, this past year ... I have seen very clearly how God works and how He moves and how He has His hand on me, most certainly," said Gaines. "I have seen just as clearly how His opposition works and how he moves and how he has his hand on things."

The "battle of morals versus evil" became immediately apparent to the star athlete when she was confronted with the choice of safely living by lies or risking backlash by speaking out about the unfairness of transvestite swimmer William Thomas' inclusion in women's sports.

Gaines told Halloway, "We knew it was wrong — what was happening in regards to the competition and the locker room and the silencing. I mean, we all knew it was wrong, and even our coaches, they knew it was wrong. But no one really was publicly taking the stance and acknowledging how this was harmful to us."

"I kept waiting and waiting and waiting for someone else to [speak up] because I thought it was someone else's job. I thought surely a coach would or a parent — someone's dad — would surely stick up for us," continued Gaines.

Prior to pretending to be a woman, Thomas had been a middling performer on the University of Pennsylvania men's swimming team. In 2019, he started taking hormones and competing against women, going on to crush records set by females in the 500-yard freestyle at the 2022 NCAA championships and tying Gaines for fifth in the women's 200-meter. It was around that time that Gaines indicated Thomas exposed his intact male genitalia in a woman's locker room.

"It just felt like the Twilight Zone, really. We didn't know what to do. We didn't know what to say. We didn't know who to talk to," said Gaines. "We talked amongst ourselves, but we all felt violated."

When the cavalry failed to show, Gaines indicated she decided to saddle up, stressing, "If we as female athletes, we as women weren't willing to stick up for ourselves, how could we expect someone else to do this?"

Gaines, now an advocate for keeping men out of women's sports and the host of "Gaines for Girls," explained that her counter-offensive has been anything but easy.

"It was really hard at first. ... You get called every name," said Gaines. "They will label you, you know, 'transphobic,' 'homophobic,' 'racist,' 'white supremacist,' 'domestic terrorist,' 'fascist,' but that's all it is. It's name-calling because they don't have common sense. They don't have logic or reasoning or science on their side. We do on our side. Therefore, the only way they can dissuade from our argument is through the petty personal attacks."

The swim star further indicated that leftists and other radicals masquerade as exponents of love and virtue but are in fact advancing what is at its root an evil cause.

"I've looked that evil in the eyes when I was in San Francisco and I was held hostage and assaulted," said Gaines, referencing the April 6 incident at San Francisco State University when she was attacked by a man in a dress and mobbed by verbally abusive protesters after giving a speech.

"It's soulless, it's violent, it's vengeful, it's hateful, and they'll do it in the name of love. They do it in the name of inclusion and tolerance and acceptance and welcoming and all these different things, but make no mistake," continued the former NCAA swimmer. "That's not what love is. Our God tells us that love and truth, those terms are synonymous. I mean, think of the phrase 'true love.' It is loving to say the truth. It is compassionate to say the truth. It is kind to say the truth."

Deceit and affirmations of falsehoods, conversely, "are not beneficial to anyone," she added.

Although upholding biological truth has been central to Gaines' activism, she emphasized that it is "just as important to protect biblical truth. And our God tells us that He made man and woman and our God doesn't make mistakes."

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