Some Anti-Trans Bills Fail, But Others Still Pending
Statehouses considering multiple pieces of legislation targeting transgender youth
Protestors in front of the South Dakota Capitol last year.
the gender listed on their
birth certifi cate and it poses safety
risks. The bill initially died in
the House Committee, but then
a “smoke out” rule revived it, and
DONNA ACETO
BY TAT BELLAMY-WALKER
The lower house of Montana’s
State Legislature
voted down HB113, a
bill criminalizing physicians
for providing gender-affi rming
care to transgender youth, but
other anti-trans bills are gaining
momentum in the US.
HB112, a bill banning trans
youth in Montana from participating
in sex-segregated sports, is
heading to the State Senate, and
GOP legislators in North Dakota
are hoping to pass similar legislation,
HB1298, which would prohibit
trans people from playing on a
sports team that corresponds with
their gender identity.
Under HB 1076 in South Dakota,
legislators want birth certifi
cates to refl ect a person’s “biological
sex.” This measure would
prevent trans people from correcting
Out gay State Senator Brad Hoylman of Manhattan is the bill’s lead sponsor in the upper chamber.
POLITICS
TWITTER/@ACLUSOUTHDAKOTA
now there are scheduled hearings
on the House fl oor.
ACLU attorney Chase Strangio,
who has played a crucial role defending
LGBTQ rights in major
court cases, praised the outcome
of HB113 but noted the long journey
ahead.
“As in South Dakota, these
bills, like zombies, rarely die on
the fi rst try,” Strangio wrote on
Twitter. “They come back to try
to hurt us again but we fi ght on!
Stay vigilant. Hopefully, we can
defeat HB 113 once and for all
tomorrow and continue the fi ght
against HB112.”
Strangio said that the sports
bills are “dangerous,” “cruel” and
will cost the state millions of dollars.
Politicians backing this legislation
are using false, transphobic,
and discriminatory evidence to
support their claims. If passed, the
legislation will undoubtedly have
devastating effects on the mental
and physical health of transgender,
gender-non-conforming, and
non-binary individuals.
➤ WALKING WHILE TRANS, from p.12
criminalization, initially proposed
a full decriminalization
bill in the State Legislature in
2019, though that bill did not
move forward. In the aftermath
of that legislation, which was
dubbed the Stop Violence in
the Sex Trades Act, advocates
acknowledged that the repeal
of the loitering law would be a
more attainable fi rst step before
focusing on a broader decriminalization
measure.
Manhattan Assemblymembers
Richard Gottfried and Yuh-Line
Niou led that legislation in the
lower chamber, while Senators
Julia Salazar of Brooklyn and
Jessica Ramos of Queens proposed
it in the upper house.
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