Two weeks after she beat a transgender candidate to return to the Utah Legislature, the Republican state lawmaker behind the majority of the state’s anti-transgender laws is advocating for policies that strip additional rights from trans people.
Rep. Kera Birkeland, of Morgan, posted to X on Thursday that transgender women, specifically, should not be able to amend their birth certificates or IDs to reflect their gender, nor should they be able to access gender-affirming surgical procedures.
“Men should not be allowed in women’s bathrooms,” Birkeland wrote. “However, achieving this goal requires more than just signing or passing a bill that articulates this stance. We need to address the underlying issue of allowing men to change their birth certificates and driver’s licenses to reflect a female identity.”
Birkeland continued, “Until we achieve that, our primary action is to run message bills, that are almost unenforceable. If a man can obtain a driver’s license identifying him as a woman, secure a birth certificate identifying him as a woman, and undergo surgical procedures to alter his appearance to look similar to women, it becomes nearly impossible for the government to distinguish between him and Representative Mace. That presents a significant challenge in enforcement.”
Birkeland’s post was written in support of U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace, R-North Carolina, who responded to the first transgender woman being elected to Congress by pushing for her and other transgender women not to be allowed in women’s restrooms at the U.S. Capitol.
The post comes one day after Transgender Day of Remembrance — an annual occasion memorializing transgender people lost to violence or suicide due to attacks on their identity.
The Utah Supreme Court ruled in 2021 that transgender Utahns have “a common-law right to change facets of their personal legal status, including their sex designation.”
“My life was going forward day by day sometimes is not easy,” said Angie Rice, a transgender woman and one of the plaintiffs in the case, at the time. “But (this decision)... gives young people and everybody who has been suffering in silence, or victimized, it gives them a chance to believe in hope and have the courage to now live their truth.”
Since she was first appointed to the House in 2020, Birkeland has led a push to bar transgender girls from high school sports. Since the Legislature passed a law she sponsored to do so in 2022, and overrode the governor’s veto, the ban has been partially blocked by a lawsuit. Meanwhile, a commission weighs the cases of young transgender athletes who want to participate in sports.
This year, Birkeland successfully proposed a bill that creates legal definitions “female” and “male” to categorize Utahns by the reproductive organs of their birth, and prohibits transgender Utahns from using locker rooms or bathrooms that align with their gender in government-owned buildings.
Republican lawmakers repeatedly employed misinformation about transgender Utahns while working to rally support for the bill, an investigation by The Salt Lake Tribune found.
Utah, which has passed restrictions on transgender people for three consecutive years, also prohibits transgender minors from accessing gender-affirming health care.
Birkeland did not respond to questions about whether she would introduce bills to enact such policy shifts in the 2025 legislative session, but told KUER earlier this month that she isn’t planning on proposing legislation impacting the transgender community.
In a post following this story’s initial publication, Birkeland said “I am starting to feel like I might as well be working on it” both due to “many constituents asking for me to tighten up our laws when it comes to gender identification and ... getting threats and hate for supposedly doing it.”
A spokesperson for the Utah House of Representatives, responding to questions about GOP leadership’s feelings on such policies or whether other members of their caucus would draft bills including them, said, “Leadership hasn’t had any decisions related to this issue.”
On Monday, legislative leadership and Gov. Spencer Cox urged Utah State University to join a lawsuit against the Mountain West Conference over its transgender participation policy — weeks after players on the school’s volleyball team opted to forfeit a game against another team that allegedly includes a transgender athlete. The school filed a motion to join soon after.
“Female athletes deserve the right to a safe playing field, fair competition and equal opportunities,” the officials said in a statement. “By intervening, Utah will send a clear message that these rights are non-negotiable.”
Utah House Democrats responded with a statement of their own, writing, “Transgender athletes have participated in sports for years without facing the intense scrutiny they endure today. Targeting them harms their mental health, further isolates an already vulnerable population, and goes against the inclusive values we should all uphold. This is not the Utah way.”
Birkeland’s post also follows an anti-transgender political action committee that appears to be violating campaign finance laws possibly having influenced the outcome of a state legislative race in a district bordering hers.
Despite establishing a website, deploying mailers and sending texts attacking Democrats throughout the state for opposing restrictions on transgender Utahns, including the only Democrat outside of Salt Lake County, Preserving Utah Values PAC reports that it has raised and spent $0. Listing a renowned Wisconsin-based treasurers for Republican causes as its officers, the PAC has also seemingly concealed who is running it.
The United Nations recognizes transgender people’s ability to change official documents, including birth certificates, as a human right.
“Failing to provide access to legal gender recognition hinders access to rights and services (e.g. education, employment, bathrooms) and puts trans people at risk of violence (e.g. when presenting documents that don’t match their appearance),” reads the website for the supranational organization’s high commissioner for human rights. “Trans people are at particular risk of violence in detention settings when their gender identity is not respected.”
According to the Utah Bureau of Criminal Identification, hate crimes against LGBTQ+ Utahns more than doubled from 2022 to 2023. This year, law enforcement agencies have reported 15 incidents.
Updated Nov. 22, 2024, 12:45 p.m. ⋅ This story has been updated to include comments from a spokesperson from the Utah House of Representatives and Rep. Kera Birkeland.
