A trans-identified male racking up wins in girls’ sports in California has been identified as the brother of a prominent US Olympian. Jaylin Liu is the brother of gold medal-winning figure skater Alysa Liu.
Jaylin appears to have previously gone by the name “Joshua,” and appears to have begun identifying as female relatively recently. Some news articles on his sister’s Olympic successes still refer to him by his birth name, while other profiles have been quietly updated to reflect his new name.
Since the 2025 outdoor athletic season, Jaylin has been participating in girls’ sports on teams at both Albany High School and El Cerrito High School in California.
At Albany, Jaylin took eight separate first-places spots at seasonal meets and races in 2025. He seized a silver medal at the NCS Bayshore Championship in the 400-meter race, and a gold in the 2025 Tri-County Athletic League Frosh-Soph Championship 200-meter race.
absolute unit pic.twitter.com/zY2eLgE5gv
— pagliacci the hated 🌝 (@Slatzism) July 14, 2026
This year, Jaylin has continued to outperform his female competitors, and has taken first place at every 200- and 400-meter girls race he’s participated in for Albany. This includes a first place finish at the Tri-County Athletic League Finals that were held on May 8.
He is currently ranked the best “female” runner on his team in the 200- and 400-meter race, and the best “female” runner in the Tri-County Athletic League in the quarter-mile.
In addition to participating in girls track and field, Jaylin has been active in girls varsity basketball and ultimate frisbee. He recently boasted of winning a silver medal at a basketball championship, and played for El Cerrito High School at the recent Ultimate High School National Invite, which was held from June 12-13 in Oregon.
As previously reported by Reduxx, the Invite saw multiple “girls” teams participate with male players, and El Cerrito was one of them. During news coverage of the championship, Jaylin was praised for his performance, which was described as “extremely dominant.” El Cerrito ultimately faced off in a semifinal match against South Eugene High School, which also had at least one male player, and lost.
Jaylin was one of five children born to surrogates, though he had a different egg donor than his Olympian sister Alysa. The children’s father, Arthur Liu, has said that he explicitly sought out white egg donors for his children.
Arthur was briefly married to a much older woman named Qing Xin Yan, who also goes by the name Mary. While she was the legal guardian for Arthur’s children and helped raise them when they were young, she is not biologically related to any of them.
Yan is a former high-ranking member of the Zhong Gong, a “spiritual movement” which is designated as a cult in China. Zhong Gong practitioners reject modern medical science and believe meditative practices can cure illness and give people supernatural abilities. Yan was married to the founder of the movement, Hong Bao Zhang, for 12 years. In 2003, Yan sued Zhang for $23 million, alleging he had abused her while they were married. Arthur Liu was her lawyer.
Despite being Alysa’s sibling, Jaylin has maintained a low profile and rarely mentions or features his sister on his social media. However, he was present for Alysa’s gold medal-winning Olympic Winter Games figure skating routine in Milan, and was seen watching her from the sidelines with their father.
While Alysa has never publicly acknowledged having a transgender sibling, some controversy arose during the Olympic Winter Games after she reportedly removed her preferred pronouns from her Instagram profile, which had been listed as “she/they.” Some outlets also reported that she had scrubbed past pro-LGBTQ posts from her social media.
A representative from HeCheated, an independent platform that tracks male participation in female athletics, noted that Alysa may have been put in a difficult position because of her sibling’s identity.
“Rules allowing boys into girls’ sports often put female athletes who may have male family members, like Alysa, in an impossible position where their loyalties are torn and they are forced to choose between supporting female athletes and fairness in athletics or a beloved family member who they love,” The HeCheated spokesperson noted. “Firm rules protecting the female category puts the responsibility of saying no to these boys on athletic officials rather than young women and girls.”
Speaking to Reduxx, Marshi Smith of the Independent Council on Women’s Sports expressed sadness over the revelations of Jaylin’s participation in female athletics.
“The Liu family represents two opposing forces: the pinnacle of excellence in female sports and, at the same time, a profound threat to the integrity of those sports,” Smith said. “Alysa’s achievements are the result of years of dedication and hard work beginning in childhood. By contrast, her brother’s recent personal ambitions threaten to undermine the same developmental pathways that so many girls depend on to blaze their own trails to greatness.”
Smith continued: “Sports leaders and elected officials have a duty to protect female athletic opportunities rather than indulge the desires of boys at the expense of girls. Despite the recent Supreme Court ruling, too many officials remain committed to policies that threaten to destroy the athletic dreams of the next generation of girls. This injustice must end nationwide.”
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