News & Commentary

Kansas Republicans advanced a sweeping bill Tuesday banning hormone therapy and gender transition surgeries in minors, the latest in a multi-year effort on the right to regulate the lives of transgender Kansans. Lawmakers will take a final vote on the bill Wednesday. It will then move to the Senate.

A Kansas judge ruled Monday that the state isn't violating transgender residents' rights under the state constitution by refusing to change their driver's licenses to reflect their gender identities.

Transgender Kansans will continue to be denied gender marker changes to their drivers licenses after a judge in Topeka sided with Attorney General Kris Kobach as Shawnee County District Court Judge Teresa Watson issued a ruling on Monday granting Kobach's request for a temporary injunction.

D.C. Hiegert, an attorney at the ACLU of Kansas, said the proposals were among the largest and most harmful anti-trans bills that had ever been introduced in Kansas.

Kobach is now urging school districts to tell parents if students are trans or nonbinary.

The ACLU of Kansas has released a response regarding the Kansas Attorney General’s letter to six Kansas Public School districts allegedly not disclosing a student’s pronouns shared in school to the student’s parents.

“What they’re trying to do is excise transgender people from the protections of state code,” said Sharon Brett, an attorney at the ACLU of Kansas, referring to lawmakers in her state who passed a law last year that narrowly defines sex.

Civil rights advocates argued in court this week that drivers’ licenses should not lead to “forced outing,” leaving a district judge to decide how a divisive law will impact the day-to-day lives of transgender Kansans.

At the Shawnee County District Court hearing, Kobach, the Kansas Department of Revenue, and the ACLU of Kansas argued over whether KDOR should be blocked from allowing gender marker changes while the lawsuit against SB 180 continues.