Anti-transgender legislation

Idaho, Missouri, and many more states, have proposed bills offering protection for health care providers and facilities, including therapists and counselors. These bills would allow medical professionals to turn away people seeking help if their religious or moral beliefs do not align.

The text of Iowa's proposed bill SF 297, which essentially codifies discrimination by health care providers, reads, "It is the public policy of the state to protect the religious beliefs and moral convictions of healthcare providers as a necessary prerequisite to healthcare providers acting in good faith to fulfill their professional obligation to do no harm."

Some states have gone one step further. A bill that passed the Tennessee Senate would define sex assigned at birth as "biological" and "immutable," a definition that could cost the state over $1 billion in federal education funding since it conflicts with federal nondiscrimination laws. If enacted, the bill would exclude trans, nonbinary, intersex, and other members of the LGBTQ+ community from state-level civil rights protections.

Accurate IDs

- Number of bills during 2023 legislative session: 15

As of March 21, 2023, there are 13 proposed bills active in state legislatures that would ban the modification of gender markers on government-issued IDs and records, including driver's licenses and birth certificates. These bills make it so that trans, nonbinary, and intersex people cannot change their gender markers to match their gender identity, which can put them at risk of harassment or violence by outing them to whoever is examining their IDs.

The impact of this type of legislation is particularly troubling when considering that situations in which personal identification is scrutinized are often already vulnerable: in interactions with police and other law enforcement, when voting, and while traveling.

Already, the ramifications of incorrect identification have been observed in the disenfranchisement of transgender voters in the 35 states that have voter ID laws in place. Over recent years, there have been reports of harassment or public challenge of trans and nonbinary voters with IDs that did not match their gender expression or name, effectively intimidating these individuals into staying home and removing their agency to cast a ballot. Incorrect identification can also further endanger trans and nonbinary people during encounters with law enforcement, a significant issue when considering that transgender and other LGBTQ+ people are already disproportionately stopped by police.

There is a precedent for courts throwing out gender marker modification bans. In 2020, a federal court overturned a similar ban in Idaho. The court stated the ban "denies transgender individuals a meaningful process for changing the sex listed on their birth certificate."

Public accommodations

- Number of bills during 2023 legislative session: 8

Anti-trans public accommodations bills make spaces like bathrooms, locker rooms, shelters, and other public places inhospitable for use by transgender and nonbinary people. "Bathroom bills" surged in popularity in 2016, mirroring North Carolina's passage of House Bill 2 that same year, which made it illegal for trans and nonbinary people to use restrooms and locker rooms aligned with their gender identity.

Proposed bathroom bills have seen a resurgence in early 2023 in state legislatures, including Indiana, Arkansas, North Dakota, and Florida. Much of the legislation introduced uses language like "sexual indecency" to describe a person using a bathroom of the "opposite sex," and revolves around the so-called danger of children being in bathrooms or other public accommodations with people of a different assigned sex.

In addition to targeting trans, nonbinary, intersex, and gender nonconforming people, this could impact cisgender parents accompanying children of different genders into restrooms.

Many proposed bills allow people to file criminal charges against those using a bathroom different from their assigned sex at birth. In North Dakota, the jurisdiction of its proposed legislation extends far beyond bathrooms and locker rooms. It also includes shower rooms in state universities, correctional facilities, and even domestic abuse shelters.

Other anti-LGBTQ+ bills

- Number of bills during 2023 legislative session: 54

Other types of bills impacting trans and LGBTQ+ rights have also seen a surge, particularly in conservative states. They range from bans on marriage to control of state funds for inclusivity efforts.

In Iowa, House File 616 was introduced in March 2023, which would prohibit the state's board of regents from using funds on diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives in higher education. The bill specifies public colleges and universities in the state cannot officially promote viewpoints that reference concepts, including "unconscious or implicit bias, cultural appropriation, allyship, transgender ideology, microaggressions, group marginalization, antiracism, systemic oppression, social justice, intersectionality, neo-pronouns, heteronormativity, disparate impact, gender theory, racial privilege, [and] sexual privilege."

In Florida, a controversial bill that would redefine defamation laws has been criticized by many as a grave threat to free speech and an attack on the press and others who are critical of politicians and other public figures.

The bill challenges longheld precedents around defamation to make it so public figures accusing the anyone of defamation would no longer need to prove the accused acted with malice— and would presume statements from anonymous or unnamed sources to be false. Critics of the bill fear those who speak out about LGBTQ+ rights infringement in the state will likely be targeted by defamation suits.