Bathroom bills advance in Ohio, Miss.; fail in Neb.
Legislation moved forward this week in Ohio and Mississippi to ban transgender students from using school bathrooms that align with their gender identity.
Meanwhile in Nebraska, legislation aiming to restrict K-12 students there from playing on sports teams or using bathrooms based on their sex at birth was narrowly blocked last week and effectively died for this session after two Republican state senators did not vote, arguing it would overlap with a current policy in place and could even bar parents from taking their young kids into public restrooms at sporting events.
Bills restricting transgender people from using bathrooms that do not align with their gender assigned at birth have popped up across the country.
Eleven states currently have these types of bathroom bans, and 25 have laws or regulations barring transgender youths from playing on sports teams that don’t fit their gender at birth.
A transgender person is someone whose gender identity differs from that typically associated with the sex they were assigned at birth.
During his campaign, former President Donald Trump has increasingly used disparaging terms to describe transgender people and recommended nationwide bans on gender-affirming care for minors and their participation in school sports.
The presumptive Republican nominee has promised numerous antitransgender policies if he wins a second White House term, including banning all federal agencies – including the military – from having programs that encourage sex or gender transition.
Democratic President Joe Biden, who is seeking reelection, has promised to protect nonbinary and transgender student athlete eligibility and inclusion on college and K-12 sports teams.
Transgender Ohioans and their advocates are pessimistic about the outcome of the bathroom bill after Republicans
Bills restricting transgender people from using bathrooms that do not align with their gender assigned at birth have popped up across the country in recent years.
enacted a new state law to restrict gender-affirming care for minors.
“It’s just disappointing to see after primaries and everything that the statehouse is still so focused on targeting a small minority population, instead of dealing with any of the other plethora of issues going on in the state,” said Dara Adkison, a board member for TransOhio.
In Mississippi, a bill would designate that bathrooms, changing rooms and other gender-specific areas in public buildings be used by people according to their assigned sex at birth.
It would also restrict transgender people to being housed in college dorms with their sex assigned at birth.
According to Wise Voter, a data and statistics website, about 0.45% of Mississippi’s 2.95 million residents – about 13,000 people – identify as transgender. This number may be skewed because some trans people do not reveal their chosen identity because of possible discrimination.
Earlier this year, several trans people and LGBTQ advocates told the Mississippi Clarion Ledger the move would do nothing but potentially put some transgender people in harm’s way.
Contributing: Maya Marchel Hoff and Kayla Jimenez, USA TODAY;
Haley BeMiller is a reporter for the USA TODAY Network Ohio Bureau, which serves the Columbus Dispatch, Cincinnati Enquirer, Akron Beacon Journal and 18 other affiliated news organizations across Ohio. Grant McLaughlin is a Mississippi Clarion Ledger reporter.