Ky. Senate finalizes passage of transgender sports, anti-CRT bills. What happens next?
The Kentucky Senate gave final passage to a pair of bills related to hot-button conservative social issues on Thursday night.
On concurrence votes for two bills the chamber already passed once, the Senate sent to the governor one bill banning transgender girls from girls’ sports and another ostensibly aimed at the teaching of Critical Race Theory in Kentucky schools.
Senate Bill 83 is the controversial bill from Sen. Robby Mills, R-Henderson, banning transgender girls from participating in girls’ sports. The bill came before the chamber again, after it already passed once 27-8, because a House committee substitute extended the ban to disallow young transgender women from participating in college women’s athletics in Kentucky; previously, the law only covered grades 6-12.
Sen. Karen Berg, D-Louisville, spoke against the bill.
“We have real, living children here in the state of Kentucky that when we vote today will be told, ‘you know what, you can no longer soccer, you can no longer play field hockey, you can no longer try as best as you can to fit in with your classmates.”
She added that she believes the bill is more about outside groups influencing Kentucky legislation – particularly without transgender girls having an unfair advantage over others’ being an issue in the state – and scoring political points than solving a real problem.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Kentucky pointed to similar bans being blocked in Idaho and West Virginia, adding that the bill will harm children’s mental health, physical well-being, and their ability to access the same opportunities afforded to every child.
“The Kentucky Senate today granted final passage to Senate Bill 83 to ban trans girls from girls’ sports. This bill is a solution in search of a non-existent problem. It is rooted in hate and (is) unconstitutional,” ACLU of Kentucky spokesperson Samuel Crankshaw said.
A previous Republican opponent of the bill in the House, Rep. Killian Timoney of Lexington, said that he felt fairly certain that the state would get sued.
Sen. Adrienne Southworth, R-Lawrenceburg, said that she thinks now, before there is “an issue” with transgender girls competing at a higher level than other girls, is the right time to pass such a law.
“To say that this is going to be ‘unfair for little kids?’ What I feel like is unfair to little kids, is them growing up playing in middle school, and then finding out after we have an issue, all of a sudden, they have to quit in their sophomore year because we didn’t address this when it was still a little seedling in Kentucky.”
The Senate voted 26-9 to send Senate Bill 83 to the governor.
Critical Race Theory bill
Senate Bill 1 began as a bill shifting certain responsibilities, namely principal hiring and some curriculum decisions, from school-based councils to central office. However, House lawmakers tucked the language of a whole different bill into it in a committee substitute.
That bill was Senate Bill 83, ostensibly aimed at addressing the debate over Critical Race Theory in Kentucky schools.
It lists 24 primary source documents to be included in Kentucky school civics curriculum from elementary to high school. The bill also says defining racial disparities solely on the legacy of slavery is destructive to the unification of our nation, a provision that some have said would ‘chill’ speech in the classroom.
Donnie Wilkerson, a teacher from Jamestown, said in committee that a vote for the bill was a “vote for systemic racism.” He said the bill should enrage all who cherish academic freedom and would restrict what teachers say in the classroom.
Wise, however, said the bill does not preclude instruction about controversial aspects of history or cause oppression of any ethnic group by another.
On the Senate floor, Wise emphasized that teachers’ free speech will not be “stifled.”
“There’s nothing in this that will tell a teacher ‘you cannot teach on a certain subject matter’... nothing will stifle free speech of a teacher.”
Sen. Whitney Westerfield, R-Crofton, said it set a “bad prececent” that the General Assembly was mandating certain texts be taught to Kentucky students.
“Setting those documents in statute invites future General Assemblies to add to that list and take away from that list, and that precedent is something I’m afraid we’re going to regret,” Westerfield said.
Senate Bill 1 also includes a provision limiting the number of times the Jefferson County Board of Education can meet, which chafed some Louisville senators.
“How would we feel if Washington set limits on how often this body could meet,” Sen. Morgan McGarvey, D-Louisville, asked.
The Senate passed the measure 21-15, with seven Republicans joining the eight Senate Democrats.
