New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu – Photo: Gage Skidmore Subscribe to our free magazine
New Hampshire’s Republican governor, Chris Sununu, has signed a bill that bans transgender girls in grades 5 through 12 from participating in girls’ sports teams.
He declared that the measure would “ensure fairness and safety in women’s sports” by banning transgender women from competing against cisgender women, who may have a physiological and competitive advantage over cisgender women.
New Hampshire is the 25th state to impose restrictions on transgender athletes’ participation.
The American Civil Liberties Union of New Hampshire, along with the national organization GLBTQ Legal Advocates and Defenders (GLAD), criticized the law, which would require student-athletes to provide birth certificates or “other evidence” to prove that their gender identity matches the sex they were assigned at birth.
The groups also warned that if the law is broadly interpreted, students – including cisgender female students who do not conform to stereotypical “female” behaviour or dress code – could be forced to undergo “gender confirmation” procedures such as genital exams, the Portsmouth Herald reported.
Megan Tuttle, president of the New Hampshire chapter of the NEA, the state’s largest teachers union, slammed Sununu’s decision.
“Public schools should be safe and welcoming environments for all students, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity,” Tuttle said in a statement. “I am ashamed that Governor Sununu signed this bill into law to remove students from sports.”
Sununu also signed a second bill banning surgical intervention for transgender minors, calling it a safety issue and a “common-sense” solution that “reflects the values of parents across the state.”
The governor said the legislation would ensure that “children are not subjected to life-changing, irreversible surgeries.”
He tried to defend his decision, citing the Biden administration’s stated belief that surgical interventions should not be performed on minors.
Read next States deny voting rights to gay libertarian candidates
Democratic presidential administrations have previously drawn the ire of LGBTQ advocates by appearing to support age restrictions on surgical procedures.
Neera Tanden, a domestic policy adviser to President Joe Biden, subsequently clarified that the Biden administration believes it is best to delay surgical intervention until adulthood, but opposes a blanket ban on such practices that doesn’t take into account patients’ individual circumstances.
The third bill, signed into law by Governor Sununu, allows parents to opt their children out of any educational curriculum regarding sexual orientation, sex and gender identity.
Critics argue that opting out stigmatizes LGBTQ students by viewing acknowledging their identities as objectionable, and could even lead to bullying and harassment of students whose behavior doesn’t conform to typical norms of gender expression.
Gov. Sununu vetoed a fourth bill that would have eliminated anti-discrimination protections for transgender people and paved the way for bathroom bans.
“In 2018, Republicans and Democrats passed a bill banning discrimination because, as I said then, discrimination is unacceptable and goes against the ethos of New Hampshire’s ‘live free or die’,” Sununu said in a statement, referring to the state’s motto. “That remains true today. The problem with HB 396 is that it makes a case for trying to solve a problem in New Hampshire that has not yet emerged, and in doing so is inviting unnecessary division.”
The conservative group Cornerstone slammed Governor Sununu for vetoing the bill, saying it “would have preserved the right of New Hampshire institutions to consider biological sex when segregating prisons, athletics, restrooms and locker rooms.”
Read next Teamsters president supports transphobic article by Josh Hawley
While LGBTQ advocacy groups celebrated the veto of a bill that sought to weaken legal protections for the transgender community, they criticized Governor Sununu for bowing to demands from social conservatives and signing three other bills into law.
“These unconstitutional proposals, now law, are a cynical attack on our state’s most vulnerable young people and will have a devastating impact on transgender and LGBTQ+ students who already face discrimination and isolation for simply being who they are,” Devon Chafee, executive director of the ACLU of New Hampshire, said in a statement.
“Our politicians continue to fail transgender youth. These laws are not actually about fair sport, healthy classrooms, or overall well-being, but rather they enforce discriminatory views and exclude transgender people from public life.”
Get our free newsletter
Source link
