Seven pro-LGBTQ+ bills aiming to expand civil rights this session
photo by Jon Cherry
There is a slate of at least 14 anti-LGBTQ+ bills in Kentucky’s 2024 Legislative Session, and this is alarming to many folks– both LGBTQ+ and not. But, there are organizations, advocates, and community members coming together to testify against, publicly denounce, and oppose said bills.
Additionally, there are pro-LGBTQ+ bills that have been filed in the 2024 Legislative Session. A few of these bills directly challenge anti-LGBTQ+ bills passed in the 2023 Legislative Session, as well as bills currently moving through the legislature.
Named by the Fairness Campaign, the following bills have been designated as pro-LGBTQ+:
- Senate Bill 134: Statewide Fairness Law
- Senate Bill 238: Repeal Senate Bill 150
- House Bill 36: Student Mental Healthcare Act
- House Bill 330: Ban Conversion Therapy KY
- House Bill 376: Repeal Senate Bill 150
- House Bill 391: Statewide Fairness Law
- House Bill 618: HIV Is Not a Crime
SB 134 and HB 391: Statewide Fairness Law(s)
The Fairness Campaign, Kentucky’s LGBTQ+ advocacy organization, has led the effort for protective fairness ordinances both at a local and statewide level. According to the Fairness Campaign’s website, “Twenty-five years ago the Fairness Campaign led the effort to pass Louisville’s historic Fairness Ordinance—the first in Kentucky to ban discrimination against LGBTQ people, and among the first in the South to protect our community. A few months later, Lexington passed their historic Fairness Ordinance. Now twenty-four municipalities across our commonwealth have enacted LGBTQ discrimination protections, covering nearly a third of Kentucky’s population.”
Despite such a significant portion of our population being covered by local fairness ordinances, legislators have not yet been able to pass statewide protections for LGBTQ+ residents. 2024 brings another attempt to pass such protections with filings of both SB 134 and HB 391, the Statewide Fairness Law bills, which aim to expand civil rights and prohibit discrimination against LGBTQ+ Kentuckians.
Chris Hartman (he/him), Executive Director of the Fairness Campaign, gave the following statement,
“This year marks the 25th introduction of the Statewide Fairness Law, which would finally update Kentucky’s civil rights law to protect LGBTQ people from discrimination. Nearly 70% of Kentuckians still live in a place where LGBTQ discrimination is legal. While we still seem very far away from passing Statewide Fairness, there was an historic moment last week in the Kentucky House Judiciary Committee. Six Republican lawmakers expressed their support for local Fairness Ordinances on the record, and the House Majority Whip said, ‘I want them to go statewide.’ That’s the first time a House Republican leader has endorsed Fairness. It gives me great hope for the future of Fairness in the Legislature.”
SB 238 and HB 376: Repeal Senate Bill 150
In Kentucky’s 2023 Legislative Session, SB 150 was the infamous omnibus anti-trans bill that passed and made law.
Sen. Karen Berg is the sponsor of SB 238, aiming to reverse several parts of SB 150. Additional context here is that Sen. Karen Berg lost her trans son to suicide only a few weeks before the 2023 session.
SB 238 would counter the pronoun usage regulation outlined in SB 150 by requiring schools to use a student’s preferred pronouns as long as they provide a parent and doctor note.
Further, the bill would counter bathroom/ locker room usage regulation imposed by SB 150 by requiring schools to offer individual spaces for students to have access to use bathroom/ locker room spaces, regardless of their sex or gender identity.
Lastly, SB 238 would mitigate some of the worst excesses of SB 150, which are the medical regulations associated with the law, which makes recommended gender-affirming surgeries or hormone regulation therapy not accessible to minors– despite the recommendations of major medical groups.
The bill would allow gender-affirming medical treatments for minors who have a parent’s permission, with some medical restrictions being a part of the regulation. As well, gender-affirming surgeries would be prohibited for minors.
A large part of the narrative of the 2023 gubernatorial election between Andy Beshear and Daniel Cameron, Cameron repeatedly accused Beshear of allowing gender-affirming surgeries for minors. Beshear remained steady in saying these attacks were not true.
A letter from March of 2023 surfaced in August of 2023, and the timely release was by Rep. James Tipton (R- Taylorsville). The letter was from Transform Health, the branch of UK Health that serves transgender and gender non-conforming patients.
The letter said, “Transform Health has, in recent years, performed a small number of non-genital gender reassignment surgeries on minors, such as mastectomies for older adolescents. Like any surgery at UK HealthCare, these are performed only after careful medical evaluation, discussion, and the consent of patients/guardians.”
With such a contentious history around the narrative framing of gender-reassignment surgeries, it is important to note that the letter also noted, “Transform Health does not perform genital gender reassignment surgery on minors. Indeed, these types of surgeries on minors are not considered best practice in the United States and are performed in this country very rarely.”
Republicans used this letter as though it was proof that gender reassignment surgery was being performed on minors in Kentucky before SB 150, justifying the widely criticized bill.
Thus, it is likely that including the provision banning gender-affirming surgeries for minors is a deal with Republicans to counter the most extreme and regulatory aspects of SB 150.
HB 376 shares many aspects of SB 238, rolling back censorship, individual access to bathrooms/ locker rooms, and curriculum regulation in schools, among other technical amendments aiming to protect LGBTQ+ Kentuckians.
HB 36: Student Mental Healthcare Act
AN ACT relating to student resiliency and well-being, HB 36 would establish the Center for Student Resiliency and Well-Being within the Kentucky Department of Education to, “gather and compile data, coordinate training, and monitor the numbers and types of mental health professionals in schools.”
This bill would also regulate definitions around “student resiliency”, “well-being approach”, “trauma-informed approach.”
SB 93, one of the anti-LGBTQ+ bills in the 2024 Legislative Session, aims to strike all references to “trauma-informed approach” in KRS definitions (the body of laws governing Kentucky).
HB 330: Ban Conversion Therapy KY
For several election cycles, there has been a bipartisan effort in the statehouse to ban conversion therapy for minors, the controversial and abusive practice that attempts to “change” the sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression of Kentucky’s LGBTQ+ youth. This effort has been led by Ban Conversion Therapy Kentucky, a statewide nonprofit founded in 2017 with the mission of protecting vulnerable minors from these harmful attempts through public education and advocacy, as well as community building with others across the Commonwealth.
What started with a Facebook event has turned into a statewide coalition: a movement that was headed by Tanner Mobley, former Executive Director of Ban Conversion Therapy Kentucky. In an interview with Queer Kentucky, Mobley shares his experience in fighting for legislation banning conversion therapy in Kentucky,
“Back in 2017, spurred by my own experiences surviving change efforts in the Catholic Church, I founded Ban Conversion Therapy Kentucky. It started as a small Facebook event but quickly blossomed into a statewide movement. We had folks from all walks of life joining forces – Democrats, Republicans, urban, rural – all with one mission: to protect our minors from the trauma of conversion therapy.
As Executive Director, I had the privilege of leading a team of passionate organizers and volunteers, numbering in the hundreds. Together, we knocked on doors, organized rallies, and lobbied tirelessly to garner support for legislation that would outlaw these barbaric practices. We forged alliances with over 100 organizations statewide, and our Ambassador training program empowered over 140 individuals to become advocates for change.
Our efforts didn’t go unnoticed. We reached over 300,000 Kentuckians through our educational campaigns, and major national publications like the New York Times and Washington Post covered our cause. Despite facing challenges, including Senate leadership’s refusal to hear our bill in 2021, we made significant strides—breaking the record for most Republican sponsors on a pro-LGBTQ bill nationwide. This momentum led to the passage of conversion therapy ordinances in key cities like Louisville, Lexington, and Covington.”
Similar to the Fairness protections, as well as the Crown Act, legislation banning conversion therapy is growing at the local level with three Kentucky cities now having their own protections in place for LGBTQ+ youth. Rebecca Blankenship, current Executive Director of Ban Conversion Therapy Kentucky, shared in an interview with Queer Kentucky, “There’re so many folks who recognize that this is such a reasonable thing to do– that kids and their parents shouldn’t be subjected to fraud.”
Blankenship shared how the Ban Conversion Therapy bill of 2020 was the only pro-LGBTQ+ bill to receive a hearing in Kentucky in the last decade, other than a Statewide Fairness Bill filed in 2013. This was in further testament to the bipartisanship behind the effort to ban conversion therapy.
In a press release from January 28, 2024, Blankenship wrote,
“Representative Lisa Willner announced today that she has filed a bill to ban so-called ‘conversion therapy’ on minors in Kentucky. A licensed psychologist and former Executive Director of the Kentucky Psychological Association, Willner has made this bill a top legislative priority. With a new legislative environment following the passage of last year’s SB 150 and new co-sponsors expected, 2024 is a new chance to ban the dangerous practice of conversion therapy.”
In the same press release, Blankenship referenced how SB 150 was shaped as being written out of deep concern for safe medical practice. An invitation for supporters of SB 150 to show that the bill was about proper medical safety and not bigotry, Blankenship wrote, “Let’s see them prove it” by supporting this bill.
As Tanner Mobley also shared, “When we talk about the history of attempting to ban conversion therapy in Kentucky, it’s not just a legislative story; it’s a testament to the resilience and unity of Kentucky’s LGBTQ+ community and allies.”
HB 618: HIV Is Not a Crime
HB 618 would amend Kentucky statutes to define “sexually transmitted disease” and set requirements for a sexually transmitted disease rather than human immunodeficiency virus.
Further, this bill would change the criminal charge from a Class D felony to a Class A misdemeanor if a person convicted for knowingly participating in prostitution knew they had a sexually transmitted disease and could have transmitted the disease.
According to a report published by the Williams Institute in 2021, “HIV criminalization is a term used to describe statutes that either criminalize otherwise legal conduct or that increase the penalties for illegal conduct based upon a person’s HIV-positive status.”
This national level report covered the enforcement of HIV criminalization in Kentucky, naming the inconsistencies in enforcement of current HIV criminal law between location and occupation.
This bill would modernize disease testing and aim to challenge stigmas and criminal framing around the contracting of HIV.
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.