A Kansas judge has declined a request for a temporary restraining order blocking enforcement of a recently enacted law that resulted in trans people across the state being ordered to surrender their driver’s licenses.

As the Kansas Reflector reports, Douglas County District Judge James McCabria issued his six-page ruling Tuesday, in which he claimed not to have enough information to grant the request from the American Civil Liberties Union, which is representing two transgender Kansans in a case challenging S.B. 244.

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The law, which went into effect late last month, requires Kansas driver’s licenses and birth certificates to indicate a person’s sex assigned at birth, regardless of their gender identity. Trans people across the state have reported receiving letters from the Kansas Division of Vehicles informing them that under the new law, their driver’s licenses have been invalidated and that they must surrender them in exchange for documents that reflect the sex they were assigned at birth. Those caught driving with licenses that reflect their gender identity risk class B misdemeanor charges, a $1,000 fine, and a 90-day license suspension.

S.B. 244 did not include a grace period for updating credentials and took immediate effect, leaving many trans residents to figure out for themselves how to even get to the DMV to surrender their licenses, let alone to work, school, and other daily commitments.

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The law also makes it a criminal offense for transgender Kansans to use bathrooms and other single-sex facilities in public buildings that do not align with the sex they were assigned at birth, and allows anyone to sue a person they suspect of using the “wrong” restroom for damages up to $1,000.

The ACLU’s challenge focuses on S.B. 244’s driver’s license provision, arguing that denying the plaintiffs documents that accurately reflect their gender is a violation of equal protection laws and infringes on their freedom of expression.

But in his decision, McCabria said attorneys for the ACLU had not provided examples of the harm the law would inflict on trans people. At the same time, he said that anti-LGBTQ+ Attorney General Kris Kobach’s office had not shown that the law would make public restrooms safer, according to the Reflector. McCabria essentially accused both sides of assuming the worst about each other without proof. The judge himself seemed to assume that incidents of anti-trans discrimination are vanishingly rare in the state.

“In hearing the arguments of each side, the Court is struck by a basic assumption each side makes about the other — that our ‘lesser angels’ drive our choices,” McCabria wrote. “Yet, the very paucity of actual examples that either side has put forward in any of the arguments suggests the opposite — that the vast majority of Kansans are tolerant, understanding, accepting and generally supportive of each other and that the vast majority of transgender persons have experienced this as Kansans.”

McCabria said the ACLU had failed to demonstrate its likelihood of winning the case, that the law would cause immediate and irreparable harm, and that a temporary restraining order is in the public interest.

“The conclusion became self-evident — this Court simply does not have the information the law requires to enter a Temporary Restraining Order at this stage of the proceedings,” McCabria said.

In a statement, Harper Seldin, Senior Staff Attorney for the ACLU’s LGBTQ & HIV Rights Project, called the ruling “a devastating, but hopefully temporary, setback for our clients and transgender people across the state of Kansas.”

“The harm of this law has already had sweeping impacts on the lives of transgender people like our clients, threatening their ability to hold a job, go to school, or go about their daily lives,” Seldin said. “We all deserve the freedom to be ourselves without politicians interfering in our lives, and we will keep fighting SB 244 until it is erased from state law entirely. We look forward to demonstrating at a temporary injunction hearing that this law is unconstitutional and deeply harmful and should be enjoined.”

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