GOP Lawmakers in New Hampshire Defeat Bill to Protect Transgender People

Only New England State Without Similar Protections for Transgender People

The Republican majority-led New Hampshire state legislature blocked a bill Thursday that would have prevented discrimination against transgender people and allowed them to use the gender-identified public restrooms of their choice.

The lawmakers, led by GOP House Speaker Shawn Jasper, narrowly defeated the bill by tabling it in a 187-179 vote, which occurred a day after the State’s Republican Governor Chris Sununu told reporters he had no position on the matter.

“I’m kind of monitoring what goes on in the Legislature, but beyond that I don’t have a direct opinion on that,” Sununu said.

A majority of the state’s Democratic lawmakers had supported the legislation. “With Sununu’s support, the bill, which was tabled by a slim margin, would be on its way to the corner office,” Ray Buckley, chairman of the New Hampshire Democratic Party, told Reuters. “His silence and apathy are a tacit endorsement of discrimination, and he will have to live with the fact that he denied many transgender people the freedom that is granted through equality under the law.”

The Governor’s spokesperson declined to comment. New Hampshire is the only New England state without similar protections for transgender people.

This latest defeat for transgender protections and rights comes on the heels of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling, in the case of Virginia transgender teen Gavin Grimm, who had sued his high school for the right to use the restroom of the gender he is self-identified as. The High Court’s decision to refuse to hear the case also included vacating the lower court’s decision and then sending it back to the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals. The High Court’s ruling came after the Trump Justice Department had withdrawn guidance, issued during the Obama administration, that Grimm could use the boys’ bathroom based on its interpretation of a federal regulation under a 1972 law, Title IX, which bans discrimination “on the basis of sex” in schools that receive federal money.  

Transgender rights have become a highly charged political issue across the nation with supporters advocating for legislation that protects the trans community. Opponents claim without evidence these laws will put women and children at risk, exposing them to voyeurs and sexual predators. In Texas Wednesday, a Senate committee approved a bill that would require people to use public restrooms that match the gender on their birth certificates, sending the bill to the Senate floor for a vote.

Brody Levesque is the Chief Political Correspondent for The New Civil Rights Movement.
You may contact Brody at Brody.Levesque@thenewcivilrightsmovement.com

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