Texas Senate Bill 8, also known as the Texas Women’s Privacy Act, passed the Senate Aug. 6 and will move forward in the second special legislative session. If passed, the measure would bar transgender people from using bathrooms that align with their gender identity.
“It’s common sense to want to make sure that we don’t allow men in women’s private spaces,” Sen. Mayes Middleton, who filed the bill, said in a press conference. “These are boundaries that have existed for generations. They’re boundaries based on biological truth. They’re based on biblical truth, and so what this bill does is it restores those boundaries and makes them enforceable.”
SB 8 revives the identical House Bill 52, which failed in the regular session. If passed, HB 52 would have required people to use bathrooms, locker rooms and shelters in government buildings, including university spaces, based on the biological sex listed on their original birth certificate. Emily Witt, communications and media strategist for the Texas Freedom Network, a progressive organization, said SB 8 could put queer and transgender Texans at greater risk of discrimination and harm.
“It creates this culture of fear and hatred and cruelty for their right-wing base,” Witt said. “It is much easier to mobilize people against someone that you’ve demonized than actually get to work fixing real issues and real problems.”
The bill would also authorize citizen complaints to trigger penalties, creating potential financial liability of $5,000 for a first violation and $25,000 for each subsequent violation.
“Texas is not going to bend to the woke left’s gender identity delusions and this bill has strong penalties to enforce that,” Middleton said.
Witt said the bill could also intensify fear for both transgender and cisgender Texans navigating daily life in public spaces, as it leaves individuals vulnerable to bullying and harassment based on their appearance.
“If a woman goes into a restroom and she has a pixie cut, is someone going to accuse her of being a trans person because she might not fit into their viewpoint of what a woman might look like?” Witt said.
Safara Malone, policy intern at the Transgender Education Network Texas, said the measure legislates the transgender community out of public life.
“There’s not really a care for how this is gonna affect anyone else,” Malone said. “This is more about the messaging, more about getting points with a radical conservative voting base.”
Despite the bill moving forward, Malone said transgender advocacy groups are committed to defending the rights of their community in Texas.
“We are going to keep fighting for trans youth and we’re gonna make sure that we survive and thrive,” Malone said. “Even in a government of Texas that doesn’t support trans people, we support trans people.”
