In pushing a transgender sports ban, Louisiana Republicans manufactured a war and lost it

While it may have been true during Tip O’Neil’s time that “All politics is local,” it’s been 34 years since he served as Speaker of the U.S. House and 27 years since he died. With the dominance of talk radio and cable news networks and the central role social media plays in our lives, we can say with increasing confidence now that all politics is national.

Louisiana Republicans’ decision to die on the hill of anti-transgender legislation is proof. The desire to ban transgender girls and women from girls’ sports competition couldn’t possibly have been driven by local politics because, as both opponents and proponents of the legislation acknowledge, there is no known case of any transgender girl or woman competing in Louisiana athletics.

But Republicans decided to host the first veto override session in the state’s history mostly to demonstrate to the Deep South’s only Democratic governor that his veto of the anti-transgender legislation wasn’t enough to protect the transgender youth the governor expressed concern about. They ended the session looking hapless, failing to override that veto — or any of the governor’s other 27.

It’s inconceivable that a transgender girl could compete if she wanted to because the Louisiana High School Athletics Association doesn’t allow students to compete on sports teams that don’t match the sex assigned to them at birth unless they underwent gender affirmation surgery before puberty and then waited two years to apply for competition. Performing such surgeries on prepubescent children is unheard of.

Read more: https://lailluminator.com/2021/07/23/in-pushing-a-transgender-sports-ban-louisiana-republicans-manufactured-a-war-and-lost-it-jarvis-deberry/