Idaho Republicans pass bill making it a felony for transgender people to use public bathrooms

The Idaho House passed legislation that could make it a felony for transgender people to step foot in a bathroom matching their gender identity.

Keep up with the latest in LGBTQ+ news and politics. Sign up for The Advocate's email newsletter.

The legislation takes aim directly at trans individuals using the restroom or locker rooms, threatening those who “knowingly” and “willfully” enter facilities designated for the “opposite biological sex” with prison time. A first offense would count as a misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail. Those caught using the bathroom in repeated offenses, however, could be convicted as felons and face up to five years in prison.

Idaho Rep. Cornel Rasor, the bill’s Republican sponsor, used transphobic rhetoric as he claimed the change in law was necessary to prevent individuals from criminal actions. “It prevents discomfort and voyeurism escalation and assaults, while preserving single-user options and narrow exceptions so no one is denied access for emergency aid,” Rasor said, according to the Idaho Capital Sun.

Related: Idaho Republicans are trying to strip localities of nondiscrimination ordinances that protect LGBTQ+ people

Related: Idaho Republicans pass House bill forcing doctors to out transgender kids

Related: Idaho's anti-transgender bathroom law challenged by trans college student

But Democratic Idaho Rep. Chris Mathias predicted the opposite would occur. “Forcing people who don’t look like the sex that they were born with, or transgender folks, forcing them to use other people’s bathrooms is going to put a lot of people in danger,” he said.

Ahead of the vote, a transgender Idaho resident, Nikson Matthews, urged lawmakers to consider the real-world consequences of the proposal, walking them through what enforcement could look like in practice. Matthews described a scenario in which someone sees him, a bearded man, enter a men’s restroom, recognizes or suspects he is transgender, and calls the police. Officers, he said, would arrive to find “a bearded man using the men’s bathroom,” yet investigate him solely because of his identity. Under the bill, Matthews warned, he could face up to a year in jail for “peeing, washing my hands, or even being in the bathroom to grab a tissue.”

He said the alternative, forcing him to use women’s facilities, could be even more dangerous, describing how his appearance could provoke confrontation or violence from others who perceive him as a man entering a women’s space. “Every single day when I’m out in public, I have to decide,” Matthews told lawmakers. “Do I feel like going to jail today, or do I feel like being attacked?”

Ultimately, every Democrat in the Idaho House voted against the bill, but the party represents just nine of the chamber’s 70 members. Six Republicans joined with Democrats in voting no, but the bill passed by a 54-15 margin. It now heads to the Idaho Senate, where Republicans hold 29 of 35 seats.

Idaho lawmakers last year voted to restrict transgender people’s access to state-run facilities, including universities, prisons, and domestic violence shelters. The new bill criminalizes bathroom use in both publicly owned government buildings and private businesses that provide public accommodations.

Critics of the legislation cast it as a misguided attack on broader LGBTQ+ rights.

"Idaho politicians have positioned themselves as leaders in this calculated strategy to chip away at the rights of trans people. Each year, a more restrictive anti-trans bathroom law is passed that expands on the previous one,” the state’s chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union said.