Kansas prohibits transgender people from using public restrooms of their choice

A bill has been passed in Kansas that would require governed people to use the bathroom that corresponds to the gender, male or female, they were born with.

It also contained a ban on transgender people from changing the name or gender on their driver’s license. The bill was approved by parliament on Tuesday.

The Kansas Senate voted 28 to 12 with one vote over a two-thirds majority needed to override any veto, finalizing an earlier House-approved version and sending it to Governor Laura Kelly. Both chambers have Republican supermajorities.

The measure covers bathrooms, locker rooms and other amenities, and defines “sex” as “male or female, at birth,” a move that LGBTQ+ rights advocates say would legally erase transgender people and deny recognition to non-binary, gender-fluid and gender nonconforming people.

Kansas’ measures are among hundreds of measures aimed at rolling back LGBTQ rights being pursued by Republicans in the United States this year.

The wave of legislation has angered and irked LGBTQ rights activists, transgender people, and parents of transgender children. This bill came on the same day that the Florida Senate passed a ban on sex reassignment surgery for minors.

Ian Benalcazar, far right, a 13-year-old transgender boy from Lawrence, Kan., speaks outside the Kansas Statehouse at a Transgender Day of Visibility rally

More than 100 people, many of them transgender youth, march around the Kansas Statehouse in protest of the new rules

“I’m what they fear,” Ian Benalcazar, a 13-year-old transgender boy from northeastern Kansas, said at a recent LGBTQ rights rally outside the Statehouse. “I’m human and I deserve to be treated as such, and I deserve to be happy.”

The Kansas measure covers jails, jails, rape crisis centers, domestic violence shelters and other spaces “where biology, security or privacy” warrant segregated facilities for men and women.

The bill defines male and female based on a person’s physical anatomy at birth.

The measure now going to Kelly would declare that legally “sex” means “biological” sex, “male or female, at birth.”

And it adds, “important government objectives for the protection of health, safety and privacy” warrant separate areas for men and women, such as bathrooms and changing rooms.

“This will protect women’s spaces that are currently reserved for women’s and men’s spaces,” said Brenda Landwehr, chairman of the House Health Committee, a Wichita Republican who voted in favor of the bill.

Supporters framed their measure as a proposed Women’s Bill of Rights, similar to measures introduced in Congress and at least five other states. It was based on language spread by various national anti-trans groups.

Senate President Ty Masterson, a Wichita Republican, said lawmakers are trying to protect families amid what people see as a small but growing number of cases of transgender girls or women using facilities with cisgender girls or women.

“People are starting to pay attention,” Masterson said.

LGBTQ+ activists celebrate first-ever pride parade in Kansas, June 2021

Members of the Kansas House passed provisions requiring accommodations for some intersex people born with chromosomes, sex organs or reproductive organs not associated with typical definitions for males or females.

Last month, Kelly vetoed a proposed ban on transgender athletes in girls’ and women’s sports this year for the third consecutive year.

Proponents of that bill said it was necessary to ensure a level playing field in women’s sports. Opponents and LGBTQ advocates say the laws are unnecessary given the small number of transgender athletes in school sports.

Republican lawmakers in Kansas are also pushing for a bill aimed at stopping gender-affirming care for minors, something at least 11 states have done.

The governor last week promised LGBTI youth lobbying lawmakers that she would “protect your rights” and “veto any bill that seeks to harm or discriminate against you.”

Carson Rapp, a 15-year-old Wichita, Kansas, who identifies as bigender or embraces “both more masculine and more feminine traits,” said expressing one’s gender identity does not harm others.

“Why keep people from doing it if they’re just being themselves and having fun and expressing themselves?” Carson said at an LGBTQ youth lobby day.

LGBTQ rights advocates say having a driver’s license or birth certificate that confirms a transgender person’s identity is important in itself, but can also prevent day-to-day problems or harassment.

The bill’s language would prevent transgender people from changing both driver’s licenses and birth certificates, but Kansas is under a 2019 federal court order to allow birth certificate changes.

Will Rapp, the father of Carson, the general manager of GLSEN in Kansas, a group that advocates for LGBTQ youth, said it’s disheartening to see what he calls “pretty awful” legislation.

“I’d like to think that getting to know these young people would change their hearts, and we’ll always hope for that,” he said.

Transgender rights have been pushed to the forefront of America’s culture wars and political deadlocks between Republicans and Democrats. At least 18 states have passed or enacted legislation banning transgender students from playing on school sports teams that match their gender identity.