Swimming Australia refutes fabricated anti-LGBTQ quotes linked to Olympian Kyle Chalmers

"Kyle Chalmers is the first athlete to announce that he will WITHDRAW from the Australian team if tickets are sold to LGBT athletes," reads an October 21, 2025 post from an Australian Facebook group, which was shared hundreds of times.

The post also claims Chalmers declared, "we don't play to celebrate their stupid pride" and called American trans swimmer Lia Thomas "a fraud".

The same claim also appeared on a US-based Facebook page called Swim Aquatics, while another Facebook page Swim Hub claimed Chalmers had said Thomas was "a product of woke culture". Both posts have since been taken down.

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Screenshots of the false Facebook posts taken on October 23, 2025, with red X marks added by AFP

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Screenshots of the false Facebook post taken on October 23, 2025, with the red X mark added by AFP

Some users supported Chalmers, with one saying he "deserves a Gold medal for this stance".

Another said: "Love a bloke who can stand there and tell it like it is!"

The issue of gender eligibility in sports has emerged as a lightning rod for controversy -- particularly in regard to Thomas.

The first transgender athlete to win a top-tier US university title, she had attempted to overturn a World Aquatics vote in 2022 that stopped transgender women from competing in women's elite races if they had gone through any stage of the process of male puberty (archived link).

But the 26-year-old's case was dismissed in June 2024 by the Court of Arbitration for Sport -- effectively dashing her hopes of competing in the Olympics.

A policy change in July 2025 by the US Olympic and Paralympic Committee has also banned transgender women from competing in women's events (archived link).

The spate of false posts concerning Chalmers -- a 100m freestyle world record holder and Olympic gold medallist -- is the latest in a series targeting Australian athletes (archived link).

AFP earlier debunked rumours that five-time gold medallist Mollie O'Callaghan will not participate in the Olympics if Thomas were allowed to compete.

Swimming Australia, the highest governing body for the sport in the country, issued a statement refuting the "fabricated quotes" attributed to Chalmers (archived link).

"Kyle Chalmers has never been interviewed by Swim Hub or Swim Aquatics and additionally has never provided commentary on LGBT or Transgender athletes," it said in an October 23 statement provided to AFP. 

"Meta was first advised of the fake news involving Australian swimmers two weeks ago. Chalmers and Swimming Australia have again requested the posts to be taken down." 

AFP could not find evidence of Chalmers making the purported remarks in media reports or on his official Instagram account (archived link).

More of our reporting on LGBTQ issues can be found here.