Kentucky bills involved in national syndicate pushing anti-LGBTQ+ legislation
photo: Jon Cherry for Queer Kentucky February 2024
There is a continuous wave of bills regulating the civil rights of LGBTQ+ communities, and many people in the community feel like they are drowning. Currently at 479 bills, there is a nationwide influx of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation. But, where are these bills coming from?
The bills in Kentucky mirror bills from the last few legislative sessions in states such as Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama – from banning drag, to regulating access to healthcare, to attacking DEI, to expanding religious freedom, to regulating curriculum and bathroom usage in schools, to criminalization of homelessness.
When many people think of how culture and politics relate, they think of culture as influencing politics. In a country that calls itself a representative democracy, this is a way of thinking that we are taught: cultural values and norms inform the development of political rhetoric and policies. However, many recognize that this is not how our society actually works, because of how money and power shape the political landscape. So, let’s talk about how model legislation works and how Kentucky fits into the national landscape of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation being pushed.
Pulling back the curtain, national-level syndicates pushing copy and paste legislation
According to a two-year investigation published in 2019 by USA Today with The Arizona Republic and the Center for Public Integrity, thousands of “model bills” are often passed and disguised as the work of lawmakers. Model legislation is effectively a copy and pasted bill that is usually from a think tank, corporation in industry, or special interest group.
For lawmakers, this benefits them by providing fully written bills that they can slap their name on, also allowing them to build “relationships with lobbyists and other potential campaign donors” through sponsoring the legislation. People can pass legislation much faster because they are not writing it. So, bills rooted in these national syndicates are often rooted in the interests of corporations and special interest groups – not the interests of the communities the legislation will impact.
Model legislation benefits special interest groups by allowing them to stay under the radar. These bills don’t appear on expense reports or campaign finance forms and don’t require registration as a lobbyist or to sign in at committee hearings. But, once the bills are in the lawmaking process, the rhetoric and ideas can go viral and impact narratives across the country. This allows for the consequences of controversial messaging to fall back on the politicians who introduced the bills, rather than the organizations who actually wrote them.
The USA Today story broke in 2019, and the national syndicate to execute these agendas has only gotten more efficient and ambitious. In fact, in 2023, over 2,600 pages of emails were leaked by an internet activist following a Mother Jones article, exposing the behind-the-scenes collaboration to ban transgender healthcare.
This included special interest groups like The Alliance Defending Freedom and The Heritage Foundation, as well as many anti-gay and anti-trans “experts” associated with known hate groups who are brought in to testify on bills as they move through legislatures.
One such “expert” named in these emails was Dr. Andre Van Mol, who testified on Kentucky’s HB 470 last year – which was the attempt to ban trans healthcare. Aspects of that bill were infused into SB 150, the omnibus anti-trans bill that regulated access to standards of medical care, school curriculums, access to bathrooms, and pronoun usage.
Rep. Jennifer Decker (R)- Waddy was the sponsor of HB 470, and she presented HB 470 with Dr. Andre Van Mol as a supporter of the legislation while he was affiliated with the American College of Pediatricians, an organization that the Southern Poverty Law Center has designated as an anti-LGBTQ+ hate group.
Pulling back the curtain, a peek into Kentucky’s role in the charade
Although she is not the only Kentucky politician involved in this national syndicate, Rep. Decker (R)- Waddy has sponsored multiple bills with ties to legislation being passed across the United States. Below are the bills Rep. Decker is currently sponsoring/ co-sponsoring:
HB 5, dubbed as the “Suffer Kentucky Act”, is a controversial crime bill that would impact state law on violent offenses, homelessness, and drug charges with a disproportionate effect on the LGBTQ+ community.
Upon public request for more information around the source of this bill, a Kentucky Public Radio analysis exposed that many of the sources provided as support for this bill are actually from a policy report in Georgia, not Kentucky constituents, policy writers, or community members. The bill was posted for passage for concurrence in the Senate Committee Substitute as of March 25, 2024.
HB 9, dubbed the DEI Destruction Act, is among a slate of anti-DEI legislation across the United States. Anti-DEI bills are a section of the same anti-LGBTQ+ national syndicate to garner political power for the right. This bill would prohibit race-based and sex-based scholarships, DEI offices, and DEI training program requirements at the state’s public offices. This bill has not moved since February 14.
However, the House passed SB 6, the anti-DEI bill that is college level. HB 9 and SB 6 already illustrated a related agenda, but in a special meeting of the House education committee, House Republicans replaced SB 6 with language from the House’s DEI bill – HB 9. So, the language from Rep. Decker’s bill was infused into the bill that had traction, which is similar to what happened with HB 470 being infused into SB 150. As a function of the national network of model legislation, politicians can use their power to quietly infuse aspects of bills into other, more favorable bills.
HB 402, dubbed an Anti-Drag Bill, is the “twin bill” to SB 147 according to the ACLU. SB 147 is the other Anti-Drag Bill in Kentucky’s 2024 Legislative Session. A statement from the Human Rights Campaign said, “a slew of anti-drag bills have been introduced since becoming the most recent tool for extremist legislators to attack our community for political gain.”
The close wording of the two bills could illustrate cohesion in pushing the agenda of banning drag, which ultimately codifies a gender binary and opens criminalization of queerness. This is a continuation of Rep. Decker’s unsuccessful anti-drag legislation from 2023, SB 115. Rep. Decker’s bill, HB 402, has not made it out of Committee. SB 147 passed Committee but has not yet passed the House or been accepted by the Senate.
HB 47, dubbed the Anti-Fairness Law, expands the existing Religious Freedom Restoration Act in Kentucky and effectively allows for private individuals to sue other private individuals under the state. This bill would also make it harder for the government to enforce anti-discrimination laws, including for the LGBTQ+ community. These “religious freedom” bills have been a part of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation efforts since 2015 and are another sector of model legislation. The bill passed out of committee, but has not yet passed the House or been approved by the Senate.
HB 49, dubbed the Healthcare Discrimination Law, sets it up for medical providers to be allowed to deny treatment. This is a form of discrimination that could be applied to marginalized people, including the LGBTQ+ community. The bill heavily mirrors HB 470, Rep. Decker’s original bill from the 2023 legislative session that the anti-LGBTQ+ hate group aligned Dr. Andre Van Mol testified on. This legislation follows HB 470 as being under another umbrella of model legislation that is anti-LGBTQ+: attacking gender-affirming care. This bill is still in Committee.
Rep. Decker (R)- Waddy has sponsored 50 bills in Kentucky’s 2023 Legislative Session.
This story is part of a series from Queer Kentucky focused on following the 2024 Kentucky General Assembly from a queer lens. Follow Queer Kentucky on your favorite social media platform to stay up-to-date with our GA24 coverage.
If you are a Kentuckian who identifies as LGBTQ+ and you would be open to sharing how the anti-LGBTQ+ bills impact you, please reach out to [email protected] for a developing story highlighting the experiences of those most impacted.
