Wyoming has become the latest state to ban trans-identified males from entering women’s spaces in government buildings as a nationwide effort to ensure privacy and safety for women and girls continues.
Wyoming’s Republican Gov. Mark Gordon signed House Bill 72 into law Monday. The Republican-controlled Wyoming House of Representatives passed the measure in a 52-8 vote on Feb. 7, with two Republicans joining all Democrats in voting against it. The Republican-controlled Wyoming Senate passed the legislation in a 25-6 vote last week, where four Republicans joined all Democrats in opposing the bill.
The legislation, scheduled to go into effect on July 1, establishes definitions for the terms “male” and “female” that align with an individual’s biological sex and requires public facilities to reserve multi-occupancy changing areas, restrooms and sleeping quarters “for use exclusively by males or exclusively by females.” It prohibits individuals from entering sex-segregated spaces that do not correspond to their biological sex.
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The measure permits the provision of “a reasonable accommodation for a person” while stressing that “a reasonable accommodation shall not include access to a multi-occupancy changing area, restroom, or sleeping quarters designated for the opposite sex.”
“In each public facility, a person who, while accessing a changing area or restroom designated for use by the person’s sex, encounters another person of the opposite sex in the designated changing area or restroom shall have a cause of action against the public facility that” either “provided the other person permission to use a changing area or restroom of the opposite sex” or “failed to take reasonable steps to prohibit the other person from using the changing area or restroom of the opposite sex,” the legislation states.
The bill also provides a right of action for anyone required by either a “correctional facility” or an “educational facility” to “share sleeping quarters with another person of the opposite sex.”
Sara Beth Nelson, legal counsel for the religious liberty law firm Alliance Defending Freedom, praised Gordon’s approval of House Bill 72 in a statement published Wednesday.
“States have a duty to protect the privacy, safety, and dignity of women and girls. Letting men intrude on women’s spaces — whether at college, in public buildings, or in correctional facilities — is an invasion of privacy, a threat to their safety, and a denial of the real biological differences between the two sexes,” she said.
“By signing this bill into law, Gov. Gordon is protecting women and girls in Wyoming for generations to come,” Nelson added.
Wyoming has now become the 16th state to enact legislation designed to require trans-identified individuals to use bathrooms and other sex-segregated facilities that align with their biological sex as opposed to their stated gender identity in government-owned buildings in some or all cases. Florida and Utah have laws in place that apply to all government-owned facilities including K-12 schools, colleges and universities.
Legislation in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Dakota and Ohio applies to K-12 schools and some other government-owned buildings. Laws on the books in Arkansas, Idaho, Iowa, Kentucky, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia apply to K-12 schools.
The presence of trans-identified males in women’s spaces has caused safety and privacy concerns for women.
In 2023, a group of sorority sisters sued a University of Wyoming sorority for accepting a trans-identified male applicant, saying they were made uncomfortable by the presencse of a male on several occasions. Their lawsuit was dismissed by a federal judge in August 2023, ruling that the organization’s bylaws don’t define who qualifies to be a woman.
Female swimmers who had to share a locker room with trans-identified male swimmer Lia Thomas of the University of Pennsylvania due to the athlete’s presence on the women’s swimming team reported experiencing “extreme discomfort” over having to share an intimate space with someone who still has male genitalia.
In Colorado, a school district has faced a lawsuit after a female student was forced to share a bed with a trans-identified male on an overnight school field trip.
Earlier this year, a Virginia school district defended its policy allowing individuals to use bathrooms or locker rooms that align with their gender identity after a registered sex offender was able to access a high school girls’ locker room.
Amie Ichikawa, who runs a nonprofit organization designed to meet the needs of incarcerated women, elaborated on the consequences of allowing trans-identified males in women’s prisons at an event hosted by The Christian Post last year titled “Unmasking Gender Ideology.”
Ichikawa specifically highlighted how “44 male-born individuals” have “been successful in transferring into women’s prisons.” As a result, she lamented, “babies are being born in custody.”
Ryan Foley is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: ryan.foley@christianpost.com
