Republican lawmakers in Kansas are trying to ram through an anti-trans bathroom ban by including it in a bill that previously only related to whether trans people could change their gender markers on their driver’s licenses.

As the Kansas Reflector reports, Republicans on the state’s House Judiciary Committee voted earlier this week to approve an amendment to House Bill 2426 introduced by Rep. Bob Lewis (R).

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In its original form, H.B. 2426 would have required Kansas driver’s licenses and birth certificates to indicate a person’s sex assigned at birth, regardless of their gender identity. That version of the bill was opposed by more than 200 people who showed up to a House Judiciary Committee meeting earlier this month, even though the bill only appeared on the committee’s agenda 24 hours before.

But prior to Monday night’s hearing, the committee gave no public notice that it would be taking action on the bill or that it would consider the bathroom ban, according to the Reflector.

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Lewis’s amendment requires government buildings in the state to segregate spaces like bathrooms and locker rooms by sex and requires people to use only those facilities that align with their sex assigned at birth. It includes exceptions for unisex single occupancy restrooms and family changing rooms, and for situations in which medical attention is needed, for law enforcement, and for coaching — presumably allowing male coaches to enter women’s and girls’ locker rooms. Penalties for violations include a written notice for a first violation, up to a $1,000 fine for a second, and a misdemeanor criminal charge for a third. The amendment also allows individuals to bring private legal action against violators.

Democratic state Reps. John Carmichael, Lindsay Vaughn, and Dan Osman objected to the introduction of the amendment, with Vaughn questioning whether it was even germane to the original bill. But the bill’s sponsor and committee chair, state Rep. Susan Humphries (R), determined that it was germane to license and birth certificate requirements. When pushed to explain her reasoning, Humphries refused “to go into detail,” adding only that “it’s about sex, the definition of gender and sex.”

The committee’s Republican majority having voted in favor of the amendment, Humphries moved to place the contents of H.B. 2426 into an unrelated bill, S.B. 244, that had already been passed by the Senate. A legislative staffer explained during the hearing that this means the state Senate will not have a hearing on the anti-trans bill, according to the Reflector.

“This is an attempt to obfuscate what we’re doing here,” Carmichael told his fellow committee members. “If you’re in favor of a lack of transparency, if you’re in favor of taking bill numbers and playing them like a shell game, this is the amendment for you.” 

As the Reflector notes, the full state House and Senate still have to vote on S.B. 244 — which now contains the anti-trans provisions — and Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly (D) can still veto the bill.

During Monday’s hearing, Carmichael also noted that Kansas’s anti-LGBTQ+ Republican Attorney General Kris Kobach previously tried to use a 2023 state law that defined women by their sex assigned at birth to prevent trans people in the state from being allowed to correct the gender listed on their driver’s licenses and birth certificates. Kobach filed a lawsuit after Kelly continued to allow Kansans to update their documents. Last year, the state Court of Appeals overturned a lower court’s decision in favor of Kobach, ruling that he had not shown that allowing trans people to change their documents causes any harm.

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