Utah Legislature Overrides Governor’s Veto of Transgender Athlete Bill
The Utah State Legislature voted on Friday to override the governor’s veto and enacted a bill that would bar young transgender athletes from participating in girls’ sports, making the state the 12th in the country to enact such legislation.
The new law, which is known as H.B. 11, will most likely be challenged in court, legislators said. If a lawsuit occurs, the measure would trigger a commission of experts who would determine eligibility in individual cases and evaluate students’ physical characteristics such as height, weight and wingspan, the legislation states.
The law takes effect on July 1. Most Republicans in the Legislature who voted for the override said they were concerned about fairness in girls’ sports, while Democrats who voted against it argued that transgender youth would feel unnecessarily targeted and that their mental health would suffer.
Gov. Spencer Cox, a Republican in his first term who is up for re-election in 2024, faced political pushback from his party when he denounced the bill this month after it was passed at the last-minute by Republican state senators.
