Anti-Trans Panic in Utah

The nationwide anti-trans panic overtaking schools is harming more than just transgender kids.  Parents at one school in Utah filed a complaint and asked the school to investigate whether a girl who had beaten their daughters “by a wide margin” in competition was transgender, a representative from the state’s high school athletics association told state legislators Wednesday, according to the Deseret News and Salt Lake Tribune.

Utah banned transgender girls from participating in girls sports in March, over the veto of the state’s Republican governor. This complaint apparently happened last year, before the law’s passage, when Utah high school sports required transgender athletes to be on at least a year of hormone blockers prior to participating. 

As part of its investigation, the Utah high school athletics association ordered the school to call the girl’s middle school and elementary school for enrollment records to confirm she was cisgender, the representative, David Spatafore, told legislators. “The school went back to kindergarten and she’d always been a female,” Spatafore said. 

Neither the identity of the school nor the sport she participated in were disclosed, in order to protect the girl’s identity, the Deseret News reported. In fact, the girl and her parents were never even informed about the investigation, Spatafore said, according to the Tribune.  He also told lawmakers that the association has looked into multiple complaints, and that none of the accusations that student athletes were secretly transgender were proven to be true.

The ACLU of Utah sued the state earlier this year on behalf of two transgender student athletes; similar legislation in other states, including Indiana and West Virginia, has been blocked by the federal courts.  This year 42 states have passed either anti-trans or anti-abortion laws, and more than half of states have considered anti-trans legislation.  When GOP Gov. Spencer Cox vetoed the bill, he wrote “Rarely has so much fear and anger been directed at so few.”