Ohio lawmakers pass wave of anti-LGBTQ bills during the most recent General Assembly
For Robin, a transgender high school student in Columbus, going to the bathroom is going to get a lot more complicated.
Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine recently signed a transgender school bathroom ban into law, which is set to take effect Feb. 24.
“I can’t do simple things like peeing now without having to be policed around,” he said.
Robin is actively transitioning and has been taking testosterone for eight months.
“I don’t look like a woman, so … I feel like a creep going into the women’s restroom when I’m not one,” he said. “People will be like, ‘Why are you in here?’ And I’m like, ‘I’m following the law.’ I wish I wasn’t.”
The bathroom ban bill was part of a wave of anti-LGBTQ bills during the most recent General Assembly, which wrapped up last week.
Ohio lawmakers just passed House Bill 8, which requires educators to out a students’ sexuality to their parents. DeWine has 10 working days to sign the bill or veto it. As of Thursday afternoon, his office has not yet said whether he has taken action.
Ohio has a new law put into place last year that bans gender-affirming care for transgender youth including hormone blockers, hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and some mental health services. The law also prevents transgender athletes from playing women’s sports. DeWine broke from his Republican party by vetoing the bill last year, but lawmakers overrode his veto.
“It’s exhausting for a number of reasons,” said TransOhio Executive Director Dara Adkison. “I never thought 10 years ago that so many legislatures would be so comfortable openly interrogating minors about what kinds of genitals they had in open session. It’s a bizarre reality, and it’s awful when you know a lot of the kids directly.”
Some families are putting their homes on the market and moving out of Ohio. Others are looking into switching their students either into online school or being homeschooled.
“It’s so truly a privileged position to even be able to consider moving,” Adkison said. “And we just want people to know that it’s okay not to. There’s lots of resources continuing to exist in the state.”
TransOhio’s Emergency Fund has given out more than $45,000 of mutual aid funds to more than 1,400 transgender Ohioans and their families this past year, Adkison said.
“It’s really been a huge help for the people that have gotten resources and funds directly from it,” Adkison said.
The funds primarily go to Ohioans who need financial aid with health care, housing, transportation, and food, Adkison said.
“We started this fund targeting people who were experiencing health care disparities across the state, and also families that were extremely scared and considering what their options were for getting health care for their kids,” Adkison said.
The grants are typically small amounts, such as $100 for a medical visit or $60 for groceries, Adkison said.
This wave of anti-LGBTQ bills is not happening just in Ohio. The ACLU is tracking 574 anti-LGBTQ bills in the U.S., as of Dec. 6.
“I have to jump through more hurdles than my cisgender peers.”
Robin started taking testosterone April 16, shortly before the gender-affirming care ban went into effect.
“We were already planning on this, but we had to make it more of a priority in my care,” he said. “So we had to speed towards that, just because of legislation and that’s really frustrating.”
Robin plans on playing men’s volleyball for his high school team, but he is legally not allowed to use the men’s locker room. The bathroom ban law also includes a transgender locker room ban.
He said he is able to use the nurse’s restroom to change for home games, but it remains unclear what he will do for away games.
“It’s frustrating that I have to do things differently from everybody else,” Robin said. “It feels almost ostracizing in a certain way. … I have to jump through more hurdles than my cisgender peers.”
It’s important for Robin to use his voice to speak out.
“You can’t just sit and be idle,” he said.
Robin plans on going to Rhode Island for college to major in marine sciences.
“I think just having a change of the people around me, their perspectives being different, and the government actually caring about me, will make a very big difference in my mental health,” he said.
“We know that nothing we say is going to make a difference.”
Hundreds of people submitted opponent testimony and showed up to testify against these anti-LGBTQ bills.
“We could have 5,000 people submit testimony or show up, and they’re still going to vote the same way, and so we’re at the point now where someone must bear witness to the attempted eradication of transgender people,” said Minna Zelch of Trans Allies of Ohio. “We know that nothing we say is going to make a difference.”
Despite the overwhelming opponent testimony, the Republicans who hold a supermajority in the Statehouse still vote to pass the bills.
“They’re doing what their funders want them to do, and their funders are not the majority of Ohioans,” Adkison said.
A 2023 Public Religion Research Institute study showed 76% of Ohioans are in favor of non-discrimination LGBTQ+ laws.
“The Statehouse is not representing a majority of Ohio’s right now, and it’s really sad to see,” Equality Ohio Executive Director Dwayne Steward said.
LGBTQ Ohioans want to work with state lawmakers, Steward said.
“We want to work with you, and we deserve to be represented by you because Ohio is our home too,” Steward said.
Honesty for Ohio Education spokesperson Matina Bliss said it’s important transgender Ohioans see people advocating for them.
“Our legislators are more concerned about passing unnecessary and discriminatory legislation, then actually trying to fix problems that are happening in our schools,” she said.
“Every trans person I know feels unwelcome in Ohio.”
Despite recently signing the transgender bathroom ban into law, DeWine said transgender students and their families are welcome in Ohio.
“We absolutely want them in Ohio,” DeWine told reporters a couple weeks ago. “We want them to stay in Ohio. We want them to come to Ohio.”
Zelch, the mother of a transgender daughter, begs to differ.
“Clearly, they’re not,” Zelch said. “My kid has not felt welcome here since she came out. … Every trans person I know feels unwelcome in Ohio.”
DeWine went on to say there is going to be more family bathrooms.
“I know there’s a worry about stigma,” DeWine said. “I don’t think when there are plenty of them there and it’s not an unusual thing, somebody walks in there, whether you’re transgender or not, people use them, so I think that stigma goes away the more of these we have.”
Transgender people are an easy target because they are a small portion of the state’s population, Zelch said.
About 4.3% of Ohio’s population identifies as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender, according to the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law.
“People don’t understand it,” Zelch said. “And as human beings, we’re always afraid of what we don’t understand.”
Other LGBTQ bills
Not all anti-LGBTQ bills passed this General Assembly.
House Bill 245 would have banned drag performers from performing anywhere that wasn’t a designated adult entertainment facility, but it never made it out of committee.
State Rep. Gary Click, R-Vickery, introduced a bill that would have made March 12 Detrans Awareness Day, but the bill never even had a hearing.
State Rep. Gail Pavliga, R-Portage County, put forth a bill that would have banned Ohio public universities from asking for prospective students’ preferred pronouns on college applications, but the bill only had one hearing.
“Just because something is proposed does not mean that it’s law,” Adkison said.
What will happen in the next General Assembly?
The next two-year cycle of the General Assembly will begin in January.
“Hopefully next year they will take a break from attacking LGBTQ kids specifically, and education policies around that,” Bliss said.
However, it’s impossible to know what the next General Assembly has in store.
“I think so much is up in the air about what is going to be kicked to the states versus things that could happen on the federal level,” Adkison said.