YOUTH
Idaho Moving on Draconian Trans Student-Athlete Ban
GOP-led legislation would subject youth to unprecedented invasive testing
BY MATT TRACY
While Americans were
responding to an unprecedented
national
health emergency
due to the coronavirus, Idaho’s
State Senate on March 16 quietly
approved alarming legislation effectively
banning transgender girls
from participating in sports while
imposing radical physical testing
requirements, marking the fi rst
time a legislature in the US has
pushed such a bill through both
houses.
The legislation, a version of
which already overwhelmingly
cleared the Idaho House of Representatives
with a 52-17 margin,
will soon head to Governor Brad
Little’s desk. It passed the upper
house with 24 votes in favor and
11 against. Republican State Representative
Barbara Ehardt sponsored
the bill in the House, while
Senator Mary Souza led the charge
in the upper house. They labeled
the bill the Fairness in Women’s
Sports Act, framing the issue as a
question of equity.
The bill shockingly would allow
individuals to dispute the gender of
a student-athlete and subject those
youths to invasive testing intended
to confi rm their gender based on
their “internal and external reproductive
anatomy,” their “normal
endogenously produced levels of
testosterone,” or “an analysis of
the student’s genetic makeup.” An
original version of the bill required
that all three of those testing methods
be carried out if a student’s
gender is disputed, but the bill was
amended in the Senate to require
only one of those methods.
Kathy Griesmyer, ACLU of Idaho’s
policy director, told Gay City
➤ TERREANCE MCNALLY, RIP, from p.3
Go Bump in the Night” at age 25.
While panned, it included a gay
character played by Robert Drivas
who would become his partner.
Drivas died of AIDS in 1986 at 50.
McNally’s Broadway farce “The
Idaho State Senator Mary Souza is a champion of invasive physical testing of transgender studentathletes.
News from the Idaho state capital
in Boise on March 17 that the discretion
to dispute a student-athlete’s
sex poses numerous problems,
including the looming threat
of the kind of racism that has been
experienced by Olympic track
star Caster Semenya throughout
her career simply because of discriminatory
assumptions about
her physical appearance. Furthermore,
Griesmyer noted that there
are questions about how the testing
would be enforced or carried
out.
“It’s unclear in the bill’s language
what the limitations are,”
she said. “There is a lot of ambiguity
around how those tests would
be required.”
Griesmyer said the bill faces
some hurdles despite clearing both
houses. For one, Idaho’s Republican
Ritz” (1975), set in a gay bathhouse,
was a big hit for Rita Moreno and
was made into a fi lm. He wrote
the book for Kander & Ebb’s “The
Rink” with Liza Minnelli and Chita
Rivera, and the book for the Disney
musical “Anastasia” in 2017. His
1982 “Frankie and Johnny in the
FACEBOOK/ MARY SOUZA IDAHO
Attorney General Lawrence
Wasden issued a bold report questioning
its constitutionality. Furthermore,
Governor Little, also a
Republican, said on the record last
month that he is “not a big discrimination
guy” and the state’s
business community has voiced
concerns that the legislation is
not worth jeopardizing economic
stability in Idaho, according to
Griesmyer.
The legislation is the latest in a
wave of transphobic proposals popping
up in states across the nation,
from coast to coast, backed by aggressive
lobbying efforts from conservative
groups that have sought
to convince Republican elected offi
cials to push such laws . In South
Dakota, where multiple bills targeting
trans youth have faltered as
of late, state lawmakers were consulting
Clair de Lune” was revived for the
second time on Broadway in 2019
with Michael Shannon and Audra
McDonald.
Among his 36 works, McNally
also wrote off-Broadway gems from
“Lisbon Traviata” (1989) and “Lips
Together, Teeth Apart” (in 1991
with organizations including
the Kelsey Coalition, which
rejects transgender rights and
purports to “promote policies and
laws to protect young people who
identify as transgender or nonbinary
from medical and psychological
harms.”
According to Griesmyer, the lobbying
effort behind the Idaho bill
has been spearheaded by the Alliance
Defending Freedom, which
has been fi ghting LGBTQ rights in
courts and state houses for years,
the Catholic Church, and the Madison
Liberty Institute, which bills
itself as an “independent research
and educational organization
whose mission is to promote the
founding principles of the American
republic, free-market solutions,
and ‘secure the blessings of
liberty to ourselves and posterity.’”
Some procedural votes remain
before the bill reaches the
governor’s desk. Once it arrives,
Griesmyer said she is hearing that
Little plans to take up to two days
to review the legislation.
The legislative effort is drawing
swift condemnation from advocacy
groups. Human Rights Campaign
president Alphonso David
described the bill as “retrogressive,
invasive, and patently antitransgender”
and issued warnings
regarding the nationwide effort to
discriminate against trans youth
“through any legislative vehicle
possible.”
“If HB 500 becomes law, it will
send a strong message to trans
youth that they are less than their
peers and not deserving of community
and acceptance,” David said in
a written statement. “We implore
Governor Little and other legislative
leaders to stand up and reject
this discriminatory measure.”
with Nathan Lane) to “A Perfect
Ganesh” (1993) and “Some Men”
(2006) set in Greenwich Village,
where he fi rst lived in New York,
during the Stonewall Rebellion.
He wrote numerous opera librettos
➤ TERRANCE MCNALLY, RIP, continued on p.17
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