COLUMBUS, Ind. — The two candidates vying for the GOP nomination for Indiana State House District 59 have differing views on a controversial bill that would ban transgender girls from playing girls K-12 sports.
The measure, HB 1041, would prohibit K-12 students who were born male but identify as female from participating in a sport or an athletic team that is designated for women or girls, The Associated Press reported. But it wouldn’t prevent students who identify as female or transgender men from playing on men’s sports teams.
Indiana House Republicans are now vowing to override Gov. Eric Holcomb’s veto of the bill, including Rep. Ryan Lauer, R-Columbus, who touted the measure in a recent campaign mailer as an effort to “protect equal opportunity in girls’ sports” and telling voters that he “will proudly vote to overturn the veto.”
However, Lauer’s opponent in the May 3 primary, Bartholomew County Prosecutor Bill Nash, characterized the effort to override the governor’s veto “as an example of the culture war mission creep that has taken root in Indiana’s Republican supermajority” and would lead to “a mountain of bad press about Indiana.”
Bill Nash
The bill faced intense opposition this year before being approved by the GOP-dominated legislature that embraced what has become a conservative cause across the country, according to wire reports.
Eleven other Republican-led states have adopted such laws that political observers describe as a classic “wedge issue” to motivate conservative supporters after the governors in Iowa and South Dakota signed their bans in recent weeks.
For their part, opponents of the transgender sports bill argued it was a bigoted response to a problem that doesn’t exist, with the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana saying it planned a lawsuit against what it called “hateful legislation,” according to wire reports.
The Indiana High School Athletic Association, which has a policy covering transgender students wanting to play sports that match their gender identity and has said it has had no transgender girls finalize a request to play on girls teams.
For the complete story, see Tuesday’s Republic.
