Hunter
02/23/25
The Republican-led Iowa House of Representatives have introduced legislation that would remove gender identity as a protected class in the Iowa Civil Rights Act.
The Gazette says if passed, transgender Iowans could be denied housing, employment, hormone treatment and sex reassignment surgery based on their gender identity. Legal experts say it would be an unprecedented move to repeal civil rights protections that have been in place since 2007, when Democrats controlled the governorship and both houses of the Legislature.
If signed into law, Iowa would become the first state in the nation to remove a protected class from a state’s civil rights act.
The bill was introduced by Representative Steve Holt of Denison, and combines bills that failed to advance last year. Provisions in the new bill would strike the definition of gender identity in state law, create a new section defining “sex and related terms,” state that the term “equal” doesn’t mean “Same or identical,” and that separate accommodations aren’t inherently unequal. The bill would also prevent transgender Iowans from changing their birth certificate.
The proposed bill comes a month after President Donald Trump signed an executive order proclaiming the U.S. government will recognize only two sexes, male and female.
A statement from Iowa Safe Schools said the proposed bill, quote, “subverts the constitutional guarantees of equality under the law and seeks to push trans Iowans back into the shadows” and “sends a message that trans Iowans aren’t welcome in their own state.”