The two-page bill proposed by a Florida congressman is just one of scores being introduced at the state and local level that target LGBTQ rights.
House Republicans are set to pass a bill Thursday that would amend a landmark federal civil rights law to bar transgender athletes from participating in girls’ and women’s sports.
The two-page bill proposed by Rep. Greg Steube (R-Fla.) would change Title IX’s definition of sex to one based solely on a person’s genetics at birth. Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, which celebrated its 50th anniversary last year, prohibited discrimination on the basis of sex and opened the door to, among other things, expanded opportunities for girls and women in sports.
Under Steube’s bill, recipients of federal funding who host, operate or facilitate women’s athletic programs and violate the new amendment by allowing transgender athletes to play on a girls’ or women’s team could risk losing that funding.
While the bill is dead on arrival in the Democratic-controlled Senate, halting its pathway to becoming law, the House Republican proposal is just one of scores being introduced at the state and local level that target LGBTQ rights. Fourteen states under Republican leadership this year have adopted laws targeting the transgender community, including in Iowa where transgender female athletes are now barred from participating in high school and college sports.
As legislative activity around the issue increases, data shows very few student-athletes are transgender. A 2017 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention survey, which queried teens in 10 states and nine large urban districts, found that nearly 2 percent of high school students identify as transgender. Meanwhile, a Post analysis of CDC surveys from six states and six urban districts found that 43 percent of transgender students said they played sports — suggesting that about 1 percent of athletes in these jurisdictions are transgender.
