A bill that forbids transgender persons from using restrooms that correspond to their gender identification in the state’s public schools was signed into law by Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves on Monday.
The Securing Areas for Females Effectively and Responsibly Act, sometimes known as the “SAFER Act,” requires that single-sex restrooms, locker rooms, and dormitories be provided in the state’s schools. A person’s sex is “‘determined solely by a birth,’ without regard to the fluidity of how someone acts or feels,” according to its wording.
The Republican Reeves stated in a statement on X that the goal of the bill, which goes into effect right away, is to “keep Mississippi’s daughters safe.”
“It’s mind blowing that this is what Joe Biden’s America has come to,” he stated. “Having to pass common sense policies that protect women’s spaces was unimaginable just a few years ago. But here we are… we have to pass a law to protect women in bathrooms, sororities, locker rooms, dressing rooms, shower rooms, and more.”
The largest LGBTQ advocacy organization in the US, Human Rights Campaign, has a state director in Mississippi named Rob Hill. He described the new law as an attempt to “strip basic rights from LGBTQ+ people in our state.”
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“This bill does nothing but attempt to push us further apart at the expense of LGBTQ+ people, who deserve the freedom to be and to use bathrooms and locker rooms without the prying eyes of politicians peering over the stall,” Hill stated. “Shame on the governor and the MAGA agenda of hate.”
According to the LGBTQ advocacy group Movement Advancement Project, ten more states have passed laws prohibiting transgender individuals from using restrooms that correspond with their gender identities since lawmakers in North Carolina caused a stir nationwide in 2016 by enacting a similar measure that was later partially repealed. Mississippi has now joined them.
Legislators in Utah enacted a bill prohibiting transgender persons from using restrooms in government and educational facilities in January.
Transgender activists deluged a Utah tip line set up earlier this month to notify the authorities of legal infractions.
It was the intention of the thousands of fictitious allegations to overwhelm the authorities and obscure any genuine concerns that locals might have had regarding the bathrooms that transgender people used.
The proposal in Mississippi that limits transgender individuals’ access to public facilities is just one of the numerous anti-LGBTQ policies that conservative lawmakers have put out in recent years. The American Civil Liberties Union reports that this year, legislators around the nation have introduced more than five hundred anti-LGBTQ laws.
Reeves passed a rule in 2021 prohibiting transgender pupils from participating in sports that reflect their gender identity. Last year, he also passed a rule prohibiting trans kids from receiving specific transition-related care.
More than twenty Republican-led states, including Mississippi, are contesting the Title IX regulations that the Education Department released last month.
The regulations specifically forbid, among other things, preventing trans students from accessing restrooms and changing areas that correspond with their gender identification at educational institutions that receive government financing.
