The Georgia Senate has passed a wide-ranging bill that restricts transgender athletes from participating in sports teams or using school bathrooms that align with their gender identity, prevents students from enrolling in sex education programs unless their parents opt into the program, and prohibits students below sixth grade from receiving any sort of sex education. The measure would also require school officials to notify parents every time their child checks a book out of their school library.
The bill is a “very important piece of legislation to empower parents and protect kids,” said state Sen. Clint Dixon (R-Buford), who presented the bill in the Senate.
“Each piece of the bill was vetted very well,” Dixon added. “Kids only have a short, finite time to be children and we need to protect that. We can’t legislate bad parenting, but we can legislate what kids are taught in school and protect them during those youth years.”
Senate Democrats took the floor to protest the contents of the bill, as well as the way it was passed through the Senate Health and Human Services committee.
“HB 1104 combines several controversial culture war bills into one vehicle,” Senate Democrats wrote in a Minority Report on the bill. “The controversial portions of this bill were added moments before a committee hearing with no meaningful opportunity for review. Worse, it limited the ability of affected persons to testify against these bills. While we work within the constraints of a tightened session, the General Assembly should follow the transparency rules it’s trying to enforce on others.”
The bill now goes back to the House because of changes in it that the Senate made. The House had already passed it.