Students must show proof of their sex at the time of birth if their birth certificate does not appear to be the original or does not indicate the student’s sex at the time of birth. This does not apply to students in kindergarten through 4th grade, the Tennessee bill says.
The Tennessee bill, which opponents have called “discriminatory,” will require students to play sports based on their birth certificate’s gender identification and only compete against other athletes of the same biological sex.
“Governor Lee’s rush to sign this discriminatory anti-transgender bill is unfortunately no surprise given how Tennessee’s elected leaders have aggressively pushed a ‘Slate of Hate’ against LGBTQ people for the last several years,” Alphonso David, president of Human Rights Campaign, said in a statement.
“This bill legislates against a problem that simply doesn’t exist and targets transgender kids who are trying to navigate their adolescence,” David said. “Transgender kids are kids. Excluding and discriminating against them does great harm to them and it weakens the communities in which these children feel excluded and marginalized.”