A Wyoming Republican lawmaker said
this week that he's drafting a bill that targets the transgender
community.
State Rep. Roy Edwards of Gillette said
his bill would mirror North Carolina's House Bill 2, the first state
law in the nation to prohibit transgender people from using the
bathroom of their choice in public buildings.
“I've it [in] mind ever since the
problem started happening when people of the other sex thought they
could enter into the bathroom of the opposite sex,” Edwards told
the Casper
Star-Tribune.
Under Wyoming law, draft bills are not
made public.
Edwards announced the bill during a
legislative breakfast held last week by the Gillette Chamber of
Commerce, WyoFile
reported. He told the audience that his goal with the
legislation was to keep people from “getting their thrills off and
being allowed to go into the opposite sex's bathroom.”
North Carolina's controversial HB2 has
led to a vocal backlash that has included state laws that prohibit
state workers from traveling to states that restrict LGBT rights. A
California law enacted in response to HB2 requires that the attorney
general post online a list of states to which travel is restricted.
(Related: California
joins states banning travel to North Carolina over anti-gay law.)