College students are attempting to store Republican efforts to ban trans rights by making the country’s largest school declare itself a haven for trans youth as Kansas prepares to do so.
On Wednesday, the GOP-controlled Legislature approved its proposed ban on minor surgery, hormone replacement therapy, and puberty blockers, evidently with the two-thirds majority needed to bypass a planned veto from Democratic Governor. Laura Kelly. Kansas would join Wyoming and another 24 states in outlawing or restricting gender-affirming care for minors, with Wyoming the most recent instance being next week.
However, the University of Kansas ‘ main campus ‘ student body’s Student Senate overwhelmingly approved a plan to include trans rights policies in the university’s code of student rights the week before when a ban was already in effect. The plan calls on officials to support individuals ‘ right to “determine their own names,” direct workers to use their preferred brands and pronouns, and commit to updating scholar records to reflect their gender identities. Officials have not officially responded.
The university’s town of Lawrence, between Kansas City and the state capital of Topeka, now has a reputation for being more democratic than the rest of the Republican- leaning position. However, trans rights proposal participants said it is essential today to demonstrate that the university will support LGBTQ youngsters despite a Legislature they perceive as angry.
” The people in charge have made the decision to help some things that are really violent and unnecessary and unjustifiable”, Jenna Bellemere, a 21- yr- old transgender top, said of lawmakers. Students and the younger generation are the ones who have to kind of step up and say,” No, we do n’t think that’s okay and fight back.”
University of Kansas students, Chris Raithel, from left, Jenna Bellemere and Raine Flores- Peña, share a light moment outside the university’s Memorial Union after an interview, Tuesday, Feb. 26, 2024, in Lawrence, Kan. The students are attempting to persuade administrators to include language about transgender rights in university policies. ( AP Photo/John Hanna )
Photo: ASSOCIATED PRESS/John Hanna
Kansas state Sens. Brenda Dietrich, left, R- Topeka, and Carolyn McGinn, right, R- Sedgwick, confer before a vote on a proposed ban on gender- affirming care for minors, Wednesday, March 27, 2024, at the Statehouse in Topeka, Kan. McGinn opposes the proposal, but Dietrich’s backing of it after she opposed a ban in 2023 gave the measure a two- thirds majority supporters would need to override an expected veto from Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly. ( AP Photo/John Hanna )
Photo: ASSOCIATED PRESS/John Hanna
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Republicans in Kansas have been a part of a multi-year and nationwide push by GOP lawmakers to halt transgender rights. They overrode Kelly’s vetoes of measures that would end the state’s legal recognition of transgender residents ‘ gender identities and forbid transgender girls and girls from female K-12 and college sports last year.
Six months ago, conservative GOP Attorney General Kris Kobach’s lawsuits forced Kelly’s administration to stop changing the” sex” listing on transgender people’s birth certificates and driver’s licenses.
One of the people who contributed to the Student Senate proposal since last fall was junior at the University of Kansas, Chris Raithel, who is not a binary University of Kansas. They said that while their goal was not to provoke a fight between the university and the legislature that might lead to a budget-cut backlash,” we do believe that if these protections were included in university policy and students would see that they were understood and protected,” but rather, to provide a service to the trans students at the university.
Despite opposition from transgender children, their families, and medical professionals in Kansas, Republicans have pushed for a ban. The decision also contradicts the advice of major American medical organizations, despite the National Health Service of England’s recent announcement that it no longer would routinely cover minors ‘ hormone treatments and puberty blockers.
Senate President Ty Masterson, a Wichita- area Republican, described his chamber’s approval as a firm stand against “radical transgender ideology”.
Several doctors are cited as having long-term health effects among the legislators who support the Kansas measure, arguing that they are shielding children from potentially irreversible medical treatments.
” The bias, as some people call it, is predicated on fear — fear of the unknown — and there is still a lot that we do n’t know about what we’re embarking on, particularly with minors”, said state Republican state Rep. John Eplee, a doctor from the state’s northeastern corner. ” This is not meant to be hateful or hurtful”.
Republican Sen. Mark Steffen, a central Kansas anesthesiologist and pain- management doctor, suggested the proposed ban would protect” troubled children” from “wayward parents and a wayward health care system”.
GOP legislators approved a proposed ban last year but could n’t override Kelly’s veto. Supporters saw a net gain of 12 votes in the House this year to get the required two-thirds majority.
In the state Senate, supporters were one vote shy last year but picked it up Wednesday from Republican Sen. Brenda Dietrich, of Topeka, a former local school superintendent. She switched because this year’s supporters added a provision that would allow doctors to take patients off hormones or puberty blockers until the end of the year.
Dietrich’s voice shook as she explained her decision to colleagues Wednesday evening, saying it was a difficult vote. She expressed concern about the potential negative effects of abruptly stopping treatments, but she has always shared her views with Republicans in her GOP-leaning district, who “overwhelmingly” oppose gender-affirming procedures for minors.
She said,” Their anger about doctors and parents allowing surgeries on children is palpable.”
Even those who support the ban have acknowledged that Kansas doctors perform a few minor gender-affirming surgeries. Young transgender adults have stated in interviews that they have spent months or even years going through hormone treatments, puberty blockers, and other treatments first.
And transgender youth critics of a ban claimed that the provision allowing a gradual withdrawal of treatments that reduce the risk of suicide, while potentially better medically than an abrupt end, does n’t prevent harm to the physical and mental health of transgender youth.
” Minors and their families are already experiencing significant emotional turmoil from facing these hateful bills year after year,” Amanda Mogoi, a registered nurse with advanced practice in Wichita who has been providing such treatments for eight years, wrote in an email. ” They will not want to stop their life- saving medications”.
The University of Kansas proposal would only apply to people under the age of 18, but the college students who supported it still see it as a threat to them, in part because they do n’t expect GOP lawmakers to go back there. Health committee Chair Brenda Landwehr made the suggestion during the Wednesday debate in the House that Kansas should think about extending the ban to people in their early 20s.
” If I could ban this until a child’s brain fully developed, I would do that in a heartbeat”, said Landwehr, a Wichita Republican.
According to Bellemere, doctors may stop treating young transgender adults because they fear lawsuits or other legal issues even without a broader ban.
Another transgender University of Kansas student, Raine Flores- Peña, a junior and LGBTQ+ rights activist working at the school’s Center for Sexuality &, Gender Diversity, said some friends transferred to other universities after Kansas legislators ended the state’s legal recognition of their gender identities. But he began his transition in Lawrence in 2018 and describes himself as very resolute.
” I do n’t want to get kicked out of my own home”, he said.
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