HB 2620 aims to require the TN Attorney General to defend schools that choose to discriminate against transgender students and staff

NEW YORK – GLAAD, the world’s largest LGBTQ media advocacy organization, today condemned the Tennessee House Civil Justice Subcommittee for advancing HB 2620, a bill that aims to require the Tennessee Attorney General to defend school districts that dictate transgender students, faculty, and staff to only use the bathroom based on the gender they were assigned at birth. While this bill does not create a school-system-wide transgender bathroom ban, it is a clear attempt to embolden school boards to create these discriminatory policies knowing that state government resources will be used in their defense.

“At its core, HB 2620 is about encouraging discrimination and opening up transgender and gender non-conforming youth to bullying and violence,” said Sarah Kate Ellis, President and CEO of GLAAD. “Members of the House should reject this bill and send a clear message to their constituents that Tennessee lawmakers are not in the business of emboldening discrimination and writing people’s prejudices about the transgender community into law.”

A similar bill (HB 1488) was introduced earlier this year and quickly withdrawn by its sponsor before it ever made it into a subcommittee hearing. However, it was refiled after the Family Action Council of Tennessee, one of the state family policy councils of the national anti-LGBTQ group Focus on the Family, convinced another lawmaker to put their name on the bill.

Clergy and faith leaders across the state have already joined the Tennessee Equality Project to come out in opposition to this discriminatory bill, which now moves to the full House Civil Justice Committee for a vote.

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