A Tennessee bill that limits transgender participation in school sports is headed to the state’s House after clearing an initial committee hurdle.
The bill, which was introduced on Jan. 19, “requires, for the purposes of participation in a middle school or high school interscholastic athletic activity or event, that a student’s gender be determined by the student’s sex at the time of the student’s birth.” The legislation passed the state Senate Education Committee by an 8-1 vote Wednesday.
A birth certificate must be displayed to prove the student’s sex, and the legislation “requires the state board of education, local boards of education, and governing bodies of public charter schools to adopt and enforce policies to ensure compliance,” the text added. The mandate would not apply to K-4 institutions.
Republican Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee on Feb. 10 said transgender athletes would “destroy women’s sports.”
“I do believe that transgenders participating in women’s sports will destroy women’s sports,” he said. “It will ruin the opportunity for girls to earn scholarships. It will put a glass ceiling back over women that hasn’t been there in some time. I think it’s bad for women and for women’s sports.”
TENNESSEE GOVERNOR: TRANSGENDER ATHLETES WILL ‘RUIN THE OPPORTUNITY FOR GIRLS’
The state’s Lt. Gov. Randy McNally, however, urged his colleagues to “move with caution” after Lee’s comments.
“Whatever we do will probably be reviewed by the federal government, and they can cut funding to the state,” he said. “It’s an issue, I think, that we need to move very carefully.”
Senate Democratic Caucus Chairwoman state Sen. Raumesh Akbari, the single dissenting vote on the education committee, said the bill would instill “hatred.”
“To me, this is codifying hatred against a certain group of people and addressing a problem that does not yet exist,” she said.
Similar legislation advanced throughout the United States following President Biden’s executive order, signed on his first day in office, called “Preventing and Combating Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity or Sexual Orientation.” It includes a provision that “children should be able to learn without worrying about whether they will be denied access to the restroom, the locker room, or school sports.”
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Utah lawmakers advanced a bill that “prohibits a student of the male sex from participating in an athletic activity designated for female students” and requires educational institutions to “designate athletic activities by sex.” The legislation has since been stalled in a Senate committee after it cleared initial hurdles in the House earlier in February.
Mandates targeting transgender athletes have been proposed or voted on in North Dakota, Oklahoma, Minnesota, Kentucky, Missouri, Ohio, and other states.
