Lawmakers introduced a record number of bills targeting gay and transgender Americans this year, but hardly any have passed, raising questions about whether the push to restrict LGBTQ++ rights is losing momentum.
Some built on previous laws that targeted minors, while others sought to legislate where adults could use the bathroom and how they appear in legal documents. Conservative legislators filed 20 proposals in Florida before the session even began. In Missouri, they scheduled hearings for nine anti-trans bills in a single day. And Utah floated the most extreme bathroom ban the nation had ever seen.Many seemed destined to become law.
But early numbers suggest an even greater victory for LGBTQ+ activists this year. Only 4 percent of the 487 bills that state legislators introduced have become law, according toMost others have either died or remain stuck in committee, unlikely to become law before most sessions end next month.MacManus, a professor emeritus at the University of South Florida, said that’s partly due to a lack of voter interest in the bills.
“I think for the most part voters really are growing tired of hearing the strife,” Graham at Equality Georgia said. “LGBT folks come from all walks of life. We are in all communities. We are in all families. At the end of the day, people usually care much more about zoning issues and speed bumps in their neighborhood than about what restroom someone is being allowed to use.”LGBTQ+ activists and analysts attribute the wins to a variety of tactics.
In Georgia, Graham said LGBTQ+ people and their families spent last summer meeting with lawmakers and telling them how much transitioning had improved their lives. And in Florida, after Republicans cut most committee testimony to 30 seconds last year, activists raised money to bring queer and trans people from across the state to meet with their representatives.
He was relieved and full of joy, he said, but he also felt angry. He’d spent the session fielding calls from parents who told him the legislation had made their children depressed and suicidal.