South Carolina’s state legislature passed a controversial budget provision requiring people to use the bathroom in correspondence with the sex they were assigned at birth. As of July 1, the “bathroom bill,” also known as HB 3986, is in effect and enforceable.
This bill came to be during budget workshop sessions a couple of months ago, right around the same time a Rock Hill school board member proposed a bathroom policy with the same language. The Rock Hill school board approved their policy 4-2 after the state’s provision went into effect, allowing the board to do so without violating the new Title IX protections the Biden administration implemented.
The budget provision requires all schools receiving state funding to follow in the steps of Rock Hill, forcing districts to pass anti-trans bathroom policies in order to receive money from the state.
Rock Hill school board chair Helena Miller said their policy is temporary — just like the state provision — and would be required to be reexamined every year during the budgeting process.
“We don’t know what the legislature is going to do over the coming year,” Miller told WCNC. “There may be a bill proposed to make this permanent law; we’ve seen that with other things.”
Miller said the main reason the school wanted to create a bathroom policy was because of “privacy concerns,” as well as for the “safety and security” of students.
Other Republican-led states have proposed or passed similar legislation, which have been criticized by LGBTQ+ advocacy organizations as being targeted attacks on the community.
Ivy Hill, the director of gender injustice at the Campaign for Southern Equality, released a statement following the enactment of South Carolina’s public bathroom policy.
“I think it’s so unfortunate that we’re focused on stuff like this when really what trans youth in our schools need is mental health support,” Hill stated. “These bills send a really terrible message, trying to tell you that you’re less than human, that you don’t deserve the same access to public space as anybody else.”
In May, Department of Health and Human Services announced changes to Section 1557 in Title IX — which deals with the nondiscrimination aspect of the Affordable Care Act — in May. This announcement included plans to expand the rule’s definition of sex discrimination so it could include discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. These changes were set to take effect on July 5.
Fifteen states total teamed up in June to litigate the Biden administration over including LGBTQ+ identities as a protected class under Title IX. Just a couple of days before the new changes were set to take effect, A federal judge struck them down, temporarily blocking its enforcement across the country and marking a victory for conservatives.
Several state attorney generals, including South Carolina’s own Alan Wilson, came out in support of the federal decision.
Kelley Robinson, president of the Human Rights Campaign, said the district judge’s ruling was “morally wrong.”
“The discrimination LGBTQ+ people will continue to experience under this injunction is indefensible,” Robinson said. “Everyone deserves access to the medical care they need to be healthy and thrive. Instead, this court has sided with the fringe groups and politicians who want to bully our community at every opportunity. This isn’t over: all LGBTQ+ people should receive the health care they deserve and be able to make informed decisions about our own bodies.”
Miller said if folks decide to pursue legal action against policy, that it’s not the school board they should be going after.
“If there are legal challenges to the provision, that is for the state legislature to deal with,” she said. “We have to make sure that we still get our funding following today.”
It’s expected that the South Carolina School Board association will create and distribute an example of some policy language for the rest of the state’s boards to use when creating policies to be in accordance with state requirements.
