The Louisiana House of Representatives on Monday passed a hotly debated bill that would require public school employees to use the names and pronouns on students’ birth certificates unless parents provide written permission to do otherwise.
But employees who disagree with using other pronouns because of religious or moral convictions would not be required to do so at all, according to the bill’s language.
The bill sponsored by Rep. Raymond Crews, R-Bossier, passed the lower chamber on a 61-33 vote, and moves next to the Senate. Crews’ bill is one of a number of measures under consideration in the Legislature aimed at limiting discussion of sexual and gender identity in schools and libraries.
Crews argued on the House floor that the measure will help cement parents’ rights while still preserving choice.Â
His bill, House Bill 81, was one of two approved by the House Education Committee in late April that drew furious objections from dozens of advocates, LGBTQ+ people and teachers who called the bills part of an erosion of LGBTQ+ rights, warning they would further isolate an already vulnerable group of young people and increase their risk of suicide.
Also pending a vote from the House is a bill modeled after so-called “Don’t Say Gay” legislation enacted in Florida. Rep. Dodie Horton’s House Bill 466 came before Louisiana’s legislature last year but was killed then by the Education Committee. In April, the same panel approved the bill on a 7-5 vote, sending it to the full House.
A group of several preachers and conservative activists supported both measures in the sprawling committee hearing, saying the bills, if signed into law, would preserve what they described as traditional Christian values.
The pronouns bill again spurred fiery debate on the House floor Monday, drawing rebukes from a few Democrats and one Independent. Rep. Mandie Landry, D-New Orleans, argued that the bill could lead to students suffering sexual abuse if coaches or teachers push to “check” whether a student or school athlete’s gender conforms with their pronouns.
“It’s a culture war bill designed to impose one group’s values on the rest,” Rep. Joe Marino, a Gretna independent, said on the floor. “It’s designed to divide us, and I hate these bills. It’s not all parents’ rights — it’s some parents’ rights.
The vote on the bill fell mostly along party lines, though multiple Republicans and Marino voted with Democrats to kill it. Added to the bill on the floor were a pair of amendments from Rep. Tanner Magee, R-Houma; they would give parents the option of transferring students to different teachers if a teacher refuses to use a student’s preferred pronouns, and require all discussions of students’ pronouns and names be held away from students to protect from bullying.
The Legislature in recent weeks has advanced several other bills affecting LGBTQ+ rights.
Rep. Gabe Firment, R-Pollock, has a bill to outlaw gender-affirming care for transgender youth in the state. Modeled after a slew of laws targeting trans health care in other states, House Bill 463 passed the lower chamber’s Health and Welfare Committee last week on a 9-5 vote and is awaiting a vote on the House floor.
Also advanced by a Senate Committee May 1 was Senate Bill 7, sponsored by Sen. Heather Cloud, R-Turkey Creek. The bill would require libraries to set up guardrails on checking out books and other materials that contain sexually explicit material. Supporters have often cited books with LGBTQ+ themes as examples of content that should be more tightly regulated.
The following day, the House Committee on Labor and Industrial Relations killed HB 40, a bill from New Orleans Democratic Rep. Delisha Boyd that would have banned workplace discrimination on the basis of sexual or gender identity.
Also passed by the House on Monday was House Bill 242 sponsored by Metairie Republican Rep. Stephanie Hilferty. The bill would outlaw corporal punishment in schools except in cases where parents consent to it — part of a multi-year effort to ban the practice.
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