An Illinois Republican on Wednesday
filed a bill that would require transgender students to use restrooms
and changing facilities that correspond with their birth gender.
Representative Thomas Morrison's House
Bill 4474 seeks to amend the School Code to require school boards to
“designate each pupil restroom, changing room, or overnight
facility accessible by multiple pupils simultaneously … for the
exclusive use of pupils of only one sex” and defines “sex” as
“the physical condition of being male or female, as determined by
an individual's chromosomes and identified at birth by that
individual's anatomy.”
The bill also authorizes the use of
single-occupancy facilities for transgender students who file a
written request to school officials.
The proposal follows an uproar over
locker room access at Palatine-Schaumburg High School, which is
located in Morrison's district. Authorities concluded that the
school district had violated federal law when it prohibited a
transgender student who identifies as female from using the girls'
locker room.
The bill is expected to face an uphill
battle in Illinois' Democratic-led General Assembly.