Frank Warren blasts TV drag queens and comes down hard on trans boxers

Frank Warren has hit out at “all these drag queens being on TV” and Olympic boxer Imane Khalif, who was at the centre of a gender row while winning gold in Paris this summer.

Boxing promoter Warren, 72, recently criticised Gary Lineker for his views on migration in the UK and continued that tirade when attention was turned to transgender rights and the Tavistock Centre in London.

The UK’s only dedicated gender identity clinic for children and young people was closed in January after an independent review found that it was “not safe” for children, with regional centres set up instead.

“They should all be arrested,” Warren told The Telegraph. “They should be charged for what they’ve done to those kids, for the harm they’ve caused. And all because a boy wants to play with a doll. Do me a favour.”

The transgender community was represented at the Olympic opening ceremony on the River Seine but drew plenty of criticism, including from Warren.

“I thought what they did there was dreadful,” he continued after Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper painting was recast with drag queens. “It was disgusting. I’m not a religious person, but you show respect.

“And all they did with Christianity was to show total disrespect. I don’t understand all these drag queens being on TV in any case. There’s nothing wrong with pantomime dames, but you turn it on now and it’s like watching Danny La Rue on speed.

“I tell you what, if one of my kids started identifying as a cat, I’d put them outside with a saucer of milk. I’m serious. You wonder about the parents who allow this.”

Warren similarly disapproved of Algerian boxer Khelif competing against women at the Olympics, where the 25-year-old won a gold medal in the women's 66kg event.

Khelif was one of two fighters at the Olympics, along with Lin Yu-ting, who had been subjected to a gender eligibility row after they were suspended from competing at the 2023 World Championships for failing a gender test.

Khelif’s father has since provided documentation to prove that his daughter was born female, while the boxer has repeatedly declared herself a woman, but the reported presence of male pattern chromosomes in her sex tests has caused controversy.

“From what I’m told, Khelif is XY. So, Khelif should fight men,” Warren stated. “It can’t be fair otherwise.

“It’s not right, women having to fight against opponents who are physically stronger because they’re male. It’s not what sport should be about. You don’t hear about a woman becoming a man and then suddenly wanting to fight men, do you?”