High-profile bus tour ends with vandalism, police involvement in Albuquerque

SANTA FE — A bus that toured New Mexico touting female athletes, and ignited protests from transgender rights activists along the way, was vandalized outside a Downtown Albuquerque hotel during one of its final stops last week.

Event organizers say the bus was tagged with derogatory epithets during broad daylight, prompting a report to be filed with the Albuquerque Police Department.

“It was horrible language, filthy language, on all four sides of the bus,” said Beth Parlato, the legal counsel for the Independent Women’s Forum, a Virginia-based nonprofit group.

Photos provided by the organization show black graffiti with phrases like “Hating trans people doesn’t protect women” painted over handwritten messages in support of female athletes.

The incident was one of several encountered by the “Her Game. Her Legacy” bus tour across New Mexico, as the bus was also egged in Santa Fe and broken into, Parlato told the Journal.

That prompted event organizers to hire a private security officer to accompany the bus tour’s participants, she added.

The bus tour’s launch was attended by former New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez and U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon, who called out “gender ideologues who are unable to say what a woman is” during her speech to supporters.

While event organizers insisted the bus tour was nonpolitical and nonpartisan, its launch drew roughly 200 protesters who held signs while chanting “Bigots out of Santa Fe” and “Trans rights are human rights.”

The bus tour launch also came after a last-minute venue switch, which was prompted by the Santa Fe Farmers’ Market Institute announcing a contract for the event had been terminated.

Despite the pushback, bus tour organizers said they would return to New Mexico and vowed not to be deterred by the incidents.

“We will never back down in standing firmly with female athletes in the pursuit of protecting their rights to safe, fair, and equal playing fields,” said Brianna Howard, ambassador and influencer manager for Independent Women.

An Albuquerque police officer said in a report obtained by the Journal that he saw multiple spray-painted slurs on the bus that caused more than $1,000 in damages after being dispatched to the scene on Friday.

He labeled the incident as a “hate crime” due to the nature of the graffiti, but in an apparent misunderstanding described the bus as promoting transgender women in sports.

The police report also said no suspect had been identified in the case, which was forwarded for further investigation.

The New Mexico bus tour occurred four months after a bill to ban transgender women from participating in female sports was thwarted in a House committee in the state’s Democratic-controlled Legislature.

It also comes on the heels of the 53rd anniversary of Title IX, a federal law passed in 1972 that prohibits gender-based discrimination in any education program or activity that receives federal funding.

The Independent Women’s Forum describes itself on its website as dedicated to fighting for women’s options and opportunities. But the organization has faced criticism over some of its policy positions and ties to billionaires Charles and the late David Koch.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration has launched investigations into several university athletics programs in an attempt to bar transgender athletes from women’s sports, including the University of Pennsylvania and San Jose State University. That comes after Trump signed an executive order on the issue in February.