Rep. Ryan Lauer
The two candidates vying for the GOP nomination for Indiana State House District 59 have differing views on a controversial bill that would ban transgender girls from playing girls K-12 sports.
The measure, HB 1041, would prohibit K-12 students who were born male but identify as female from participating in a sport or an athletic team that is designated for women or girls, The Associated Press reported. But it wouldn’t prevent students who identify as female or transgender men from playing on men’s sports teams.
Indiana House Republicans are now vowing to override Gov. Eric Holcomb’s veto of the bill, including Rep. Ryan Lauer, R-Columbus, who touted the measure in a recent campaign mailer as an effort to “protect equal opportunity in girls’ sports” and telling voters that he “will proudly vote to overturn the veto.”
However, Lauer’s opponent in the May 3 primary, Bartholomew County Prosecutor Bill Nash, characterized the effort to override the governor’s veto “as an example of the culture war mission creep that has taken root in Indiana’s Republican supermajority” and would lead to “a mountain of bad press about Indiana.”
The bill faced intense opposition this year before being approved by the GOP-dominated legislature that embraced what has become a conservative cause across the country, according to wire reports.
Eleven other Republican-led states have adopted such laws that political observers describe as a classic “wedge issue” to motivate conservative supporters after the governors in Iowa and South Dakota signed their bans in recent weeks.
Opponents of the transgender sports bill argued it was a bigoted response to a problem that doesn’t exist, with the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana saying it planned a lawsuit against what it called “hateful legislation,” according to wire reports.
The Indiana High School Athletic Association, which has a policy covering transgender students wanting to play sports that match their gender identity and has said it has had no transgender girls finalize a request to play on girls teams.
The bill, however, cleared the House in a 66-30 vote in January, with Lauer voting in favor of the measure. The Senate followed suit last month, voting 32-18 to send the bill to Holcomb’s desk.
But Holcomb, a Republican, vetoed the bill three weeks later, saying that the legislation “falls short” of providing a consistent statewide policy for what he called “fairness in K-12 sports,” according to wire reports.
On Monday, Lauer, who is seeking a third term representing District 59, told The Republic that the bill is needed “to protect the ability for girls to compete on a fair and level playing field” and gain college athletic scholarships.
Lauer suggested that if K-12 schools wanted to include athletes of different gender identities in the same sporting events, “there’s nothing stopping (them) from having co-ed sports and co-ed competitions.”
Lauer didn’t provide any examples of transgender girls in Indiana outperforming their cisgender peers, but pointed to an athlete at the University of Pennsylvania who recently became the first transgender woman to win an NCAA swimming championship.
“Read the news,” Lauer said. “There have been a number of situations. There was a recent controversy of the swimmer recently in college sports. But I disagree that it’s not a real issue that needs to have a clear policy are from the state for our schools and athletic events from our schools. So, it is an issue nationally and in our state, and it’s, in my opinion, a highly political and cultural matter that requires, I believe, a policy to be clear about Indiana standing for the protection of girls sports.”
Nash said overriding the governor’s veto is a “petty, culture-war molehill” and “threatens to stifle our current economic prosperity.”
“Current State Rep. Ryan Lauer’s vote to override Gov. Holcomb’s veto of a bill seeking to ban transgender athletes from participating in girls’ and women’s sports is yet another fine example of the culture war mission creep that has taken root in Indiana’s Republican supermajority and threatens to stifle our current economic prosperity,” Nash told The Republic.
Nash pointed to the national uproar seven years ago over a religious objections law signed by former Gov. Mike Pence, a Columbus native, which opponents maintained could be used to discriminate against gays and lesbians. The Republican-dominated Legislature quickly made revisions blocking its use as a legal defense for refusing to provide services and preventing the law from overriding local ordinances with LGBT protections, according to wire reports.
“To override Gov. Holcomb’s veto is to make a mountain of bad press about Indiana, not to mention hurt feelings for trans children and the people who love them, out of a petty, culture-war molehill,” Nash said. “Didn’t we learn anything from the passage of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act? I wonder how many major employers seeking to relocate just scratched Indiana off of their short list.”
