North Dakota governor signs trans athlete bans into law
North Dakota`s Republican Gov. Doug Burgum on Tuesday night signed transgender athlete bans into law, correctly prohibiting transgender women and girls from becoming a member of woman sports activities groups in K-12 and university.
Lawmakers withinside the House and Senate surpassed the payments with veto-evidence majorities this 12 months. If the governor had vetoed the payments or refused to signal them, the payments in all likelihood would`ve nonetheless come to be law.
Burgum stated in a announcement that during the last years, with greater than 27,000 college students taking part in North Dakota excessive faculty sports activities, “there nonetheless has now no longer been a unmarried recorded incident of a transgender lady gambling or getting into the system to even ask to play on a North Dakota women` team.”
Nevertheless, the Legislature has now “resoundingly determined” that regulations past the contemporary guidelines for women` sports activities need to be codified in kingdom law, he stated.
At least 19 different states have imposed regulations on transgender athletes.
Burgum added: “Concerns raised final consultation approximately such rules jeopardizing the cappotential to host nearby and countrywide collegiate tournaments have now no longer materialized withinside the kind of 20 states which have surpassed comparable law.”
Republican lawmakers throughout the U.S. have drafted masses of legal guidelines this 12 months to beat back on LGBTQ+ freedoms, specifically focused on transgender people`s normal lives — which include sports activities, fitness care, bathrooms, offices and schools.
The Biden management this month proposed a rule, which nonetheless faces a prolonged approval system, to forbid outright bans on transgender athletes.
In 2021, Burgum vetoed a almost equal invoice that could have banned transgender women from gambling on women` groups in public schools. Lawmakers didn`t have sufficient votes that 12 months to override the veto.
This 12 months, lawmakers wrote new law to duplicate and extend that invoice — which include on the university level. Those payments are actually law.
Trisha Ahmed is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit countrywide carrier application that locations reporters in neighborhood newsrooms to record on undercovered issues. Follow Trisha Ahmed on Twitter: @TrishaAhmed15.
