The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill that would ban transgender athletes from cis-gender women’s and girls’ sports at federally funded schools and educational institutions.
The vote, which came down almost entirely along party lines on Jan. 14, was 218 to 206. Democratic Reps. Vicente Gonzalez and Henry Cuellar of Texas voted in favor of the bill, and Democratic Rep. Don Davis of North Carolina voted “present,” declining to give a position.
LGBTQ activist groups the Human Rights Campaign and Garden State Equality were outraged by the passage of the bill.
“We all want sports to be fair, students to be safe, and young people to have the opportunity to participate alongside their peers,” said HRC President Kelley Robinson in a statement.
“But this kind of blanket ban deprives kids of those things,” Robinson continued. “This bill would expose young people to harassment and discrimination, emboldening people to question the gender of kids who don’t fit a narrow view of how they’re supposed to dress or look. It could even expose children to invasive, inappropriate questions and examinations. Participating in sports is about learning the values of teamwork, dedication, and perseverance. And for so many students, sports are about finding somewhere to belong. We should want that for all kids – not partisan policies that make life harder for them.”
GSE said in a statement that the bill fails to address any “real barriers actually faced by women and girls who are athletes. Instead, it promotes discrimination against the most vulnerable and stigmatized students, with a disproportionate impact on trans athletes, intersex athletes, black and brown athletes, and those at the intersections.
“Not only is this simply wrong, it would also put New Jersey schools in a bind, trapped between a discriminatory federal law and compliance with the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination. Furthermore, this bill reaches far beyond sports. It creates a precedent for invalidating the legal recognition of trans and nonbinary people’s gender — even in a state like New Jersey.”
The bill now moves to the Republican-controlled Senate.
Here in New Jersey last month, Democratic State Senate Deputy Majority Leader Paul Sarlo stoked outrage in a NJPBS TV interview when he referred to transgender women as men and endorsed banning them from women’s sports. “It’s very simple, males shouldn’t be participating in women’s sports, whether it’s at the rec level, the high school level, the collegiate level, period. That’s the end,” Sarlo said.
The legislation now goes to the U.S. Senate. It’s outlook in the Senate is unclear. If it does pass, President-elect Trump will most likely sign it as he promised during his campaign to use executive power to implement a similar trans sports ban.
