Texas lawmakers have passed a bill banning transgender people from using public restrooms that align with their gender identity.
Texas Senate Bill 8 prohibits transgender people from using multiple-occupancy bathrooms and changing rooms that match their gender identity in schools and government-owned buildings.
The measure, passed late Wednesday, also requires prison inmates in state custody to be housed according to their biological sex and bars transgender women from women’s domestic violence shelters, unless they are dependents of a biological woman who is also accessing services.
A first-offense violation of the new policy carries a $25,000 fine, while a second offense incurs a $125,000 fine. According to the text, each day of continued violation counts as a separate offense.
In a post on X, Republican State Sen. Mayes Middleton called the measure “the strongest Women’s Privacy Act in America.”
“Texas will not bend to the woke left’s gender delusions, and we will not allow men into women’s private spaces,” Middleton, the bill’s primary sponsor, said Wednesday night.
According to The Hill, Texas senators passed SB 8 in August, during the second special legislative session called by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott amid a fight among state lawmakers over redrawing congressional districts. After increasing the bill’s financial penalties last week, Texas House lawmakers sent it back to the Senate for approval.
After the Aug. 28 House passage of SB 8, Ash Hall, policy and advocacy strategist for the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, said the bill “is bad for trans and intersex people, bad for cisgender people, bad for business, bad for public health and safety, and bad for Texas.”
“It is unconscionable and unconstitutional to pass this bathroom ban,” Hall said in a statement. “Texans, including the transgender community, should be able to safely use public facilities that align with our gender identities as a basic matter of respect, safety, and privacy. Instead, S.B. 8 will encourage ‘gender policing’ by bad actors who seek to harass or harm transgender people — or anyone who may not conform to stereotypical gender roles in public spaces.
“This law puts anyone at risk who doesn’t seem masculine or feminine enough to a random stranger, including the cisgender girls and women this bill purports to protect,” Hall added. “Some people might forgo using public restrooms entirely out of fear for their safety, even if it endangers their health.”
The measure now heads to Abbott’s desk next for his signature.
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