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House Republicans this week in Lansing pushed through a bill that restricts students’ access to school restrooms, locker rooms and changing rooms that can accommodate multiple people at a time based on their sex assigned at birth.
Transgender student rights and restrictions on those rights have played a prominent role among the controversies in this year’s session of the Michigan Legislature. It may be the biggest cultural wedge issue playing out right now in Lansing.
In May, the House also adopted a GOP bill to place new restrictions on transgender girl athletes in high school sports.
For Republicans, it’s a wedge issue that forces some Democrats into either casting a tough vote or sitting one out.
Six House Dems were absent or abstained from the “bathroom bill” vote on Thursday. At least one, though, was at the Capitol to vote on other bills that day.
The legislation would require K-12 schools, public universities and other educational institutions to ensure multi-occupancy restrooms and changing areas are restricted by the sex listed on a student’s original birth certificate.
Many of the bill’s GOP backers said their religious faith was central to their reasons for sponsoring and supporting the legislation.
“I believe, as do many parents, that a loving creator has made human beings in his image. I believe that the all-wise creator has created two biological sexes, male and female, equally dignified in his eyes, but distinctly different,” said Representative Joseph Fox (R-Fremont), a bill sponsor. “May not another class period go by without our chamber taking a courageous stand to pass this critical, commonsense, creation-rooted legislation.”
Democrats including Representative Laurie Pohutsky (D-Livonia) called the bill a distraction deployed by Republicans that uses transgender teenagers as political pawns while the state budget remains unfinished less than a month from the October 1 deadline to avert a partial government shutdown.
“There’s been no meaningful work to get us any further away from a budget shutdown than we already are, but also it’s a violation of our civil rights act,” she said. “It’s just using trans kids as a scapegoat and bullying them.”
Representative Emily Dievendorf (D-Lansing) said the bill is impractical. “Unless schools would like to institute gender checks on anybody that they suspect, there is no way to really enforce that legislation,” said Dievendorf. Enforceability would be a constitutional issue that could be used in a legal challenge if the bill is ever enacted into law.
But it is a near-certainty that won’t happen.
That’s because the bill now goes to the Michigan Senate, which is controlled by Democrats and Majority Leader Winnie Brinks (D-Grand Rapids) says the bill is dead on arrival.
“We will not be taking this legislation up and we wish that the Republicans in the House of Representatives were as obsessed with passing the state budget as they are with kids using the bathroom,” she said in a statement from her office.
Expect Democrats to be asking why anything but the budget is on the voting board in response to every wedge bill and oversight hearing with a seemingly political tint between now and October 1 as the state continues to face the real possibility of a partial government shutdown.
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Have questions about Michigan politics? Or, just want to let us know what you want more of (less of?) in the newsletter? We always want to hear from you! Shoot us an email at politics@michiganpublic.org!
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With exactly four weeks before a possible partial state government shutdown, the question hanging over Lansing remains: where do things stand in state budget negotiations?
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What we’re talking about at the dinner table
Minority report: Democratic state House Minority Leader Ranjeev Puri has served as Republican House Speaker Matt Hall’s punching bag throughout this session. Puri shared his thoughts on the GOP leader’s pugilism and why House Democrats have to be part of resolving the budget impasse on Michigan Public Television’s Off The Record this week. Puri said he is pessimistic on reaching a budget deal before October 1 and blames Hall. “There is one rookie leader here who is making rookie mistakes,” he says. You can catch the broadcast on your local public television station or watch it here.
Fake electors: A court hearing next week could decide if some Republican Party insiders face a trial on charges tied to the 2020 presidential election. That year, then Democratic-presidential candidate Joe Biden “received more votes in Michigan than former-and-current president Republican Donald Trump. But more than a dozen Republicans showed up at the [state] capitol falsely claiming to be official presidential electors on the day the state’s vote in the electoral college was set to be cast. Fifteen people now face state forgery and conspiracy charges. Prosecutors allege the so-called false electors were trying to overturn the 2020 election results,” Michigan Public’s Steve Carmody reports. A Lansing judge may determine if there’s enough evidence to send the case to trial at the Tuesday hearing.
Rogers’ ask to Duggan: Republican Senate candidate (and former U.S. Representative) Mike Rogers this week called for Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan (and independent candidate for governor) to ask President Donald Trump to send “backup” to Detroit to help fight crime. “Rogers' announcement comes after Trump has taken criticism from some Democrats and praise from many Republicans for deploying National Guard troops in Washington D.C. and threatening to do so in other cities, including Chicago, to battle crime.” Todd Spangler of the Detroit Free Press reports. The Democratic candidates running in the open U.S. Senate race were quick to respond. “State Sen. Mallory McMorrow, of Royal Oak, reacted on social media platform X by referring back to a comment she made after Trump visited Michigan ahead of last November's presidential election and said that all of the U.S. would look like Detroit if Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris won. ‘Don't come back,’ she said at the time, along with a profanity. Former Wayne County Health Director Abdul El-Sayed of Ann Arbor also posted on X, asking Rogers, ‘What’s the male version of a Karen?’ the slang term for an angry, white woman. U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens, D-Birmingham, who is also running for the open seat, put out a statement saying Rogers' suggestion amounts to calling for a deployment of the National Guard to Detroit,” Spanger reports.
Rick Pluta & Zoe Clark
Co-hosts, It’s Just Politics
