In the wake of the controversial win by transgender swimmer Lia Thomas, Utah Republicans just shocked the nation. After a bill to ban transgender people from competing in women’s and girl’s sports in Utah was vetoed by the Republican Governor, Spencer Cox, the legislature put their proverbial feet down.
In a 21-8 vote in the Utah state senate, and a 56-18 vote in the Utah state house, lawmakers overruled the Governor’s veto, which many voters were furious about. The bill will now pass regardless of the veto as the legislature united enough to strong-arm Cox out of his veto pen.
CNN reported on some of the verbiages of the law that will now go into effect, while other states watch and potential precedent is set:
Utah’s law states that “a student of the male sex may not compete, and a public school or (Local Education Agency) may not allow a student of the male sex to compete, with a team designated for students of the female sex in an interscholastic athletic activity.” It defines “sex” as “the biological, physical condition of being male or female, determined by an individual’s genetics and anatomy at birth.”
We find it ironic that the world we live in is so divided on party lines. Although we can only speculate, one may wonder if someone were to post the Utah law’s wording on Twitter if they would be banned for “hate speech” or “fact-checked” for trying to define biological sex.
Utah has become the 12th state to put into effect a ban of this nature. Iowa and South Dakota recently did similar actions. Red states have been following each other to legislate new laws lately to push back on the rapidly changing cultural landscape caused in part by an increasingly liberal federal government.
Also reported by CNN in part:
Following the override, Cox said he was “heartened that the Legislature agreed to indemnify school districts and the Utah High School Athletics Association from the enormous financial burden that inevitable litigation will have on them. I remain hopeful that we will continue to work toward a more inclusive, fair and compassionate policy during the interim.
“HB 11 stipulates that if a court ever strikes down the ban, the ruling would trigger the creation of a commission that would “establish a baseline range of physical characteristics for students participating in a specific gender-designated activity at a specific age to provide the context for the evaluation of an individual student’s eligibility for a given gender-designated interscholastic activity.”
Red state governors have increasingly tried to play the moderate while red states and even some swing states like Arizona and Georgia have been legislating laws to enact right-leaning laws and things such as voter integrity. In the future, we may be a much more divided nation as red states try to go their own way while the federal government leans the other way.
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