By Mariana Alfaro, Marianna Sotomayor · The Washington Post (c) 2024
Rep. Nancy Mace (R-South Carolina) has introduced a resolution to ban transgender women from female bathrooms in the Capitol, weeks after the historic election of Rep.-elect Sarah McBride (D-Delaware), the first openly trans person to serve in Congress.
While McBride has not joined Congress yet – she will be among the freshman class of House members to be sworn in Jan. 3 – Mace’s resolution would amend House rules to block McBride and any other trans person visiting the Capitol from using bathrooms associated with their gender identity.
The resolution does not specifically name McBride, but Mace said Tuesday that “it’s 100 percent because of McBride,” and that the future congresswoman “doesn’t get a say” in shaping the first-of-its-kind policy.
“This is about women and our right to privacy, our right to safety,” Mace said of the measure that she introduced Monday. “I’m not going to allow biological men into women’s private spaces. It is the height of hypocrisy.”
McBride declined to answer questions on the matter while leaving the House Democratic caucus meeting Tuesday.McBride did respond to Mace’s resolution shortly after it was filed Monday night, saying in a post on X that “every day Americans go to work with people who have life journeys different than their own and engage with them respectfully, I hope members of Congress can muster that same kindness.”
“This is a blatant attempt from far-right-wing extremists to distract from the fact that they have no real solutions to what Americans are facing,” McBride added. “We should be focused on bringing down the cost of housing, health care, and child care, not manufacturing culture wars.”
The newly ignited debate is forcing the House to grapple with an unprecedented issue: how to address transgender individuals in the Capitol complex without infringing on their rights. The Republican Party campaigned on targeting transgender individuals; President-elect Donald Trump’s closing argument focused on the issue.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) addressed the issue during House Republicans’ weekly conference meeting Tuesday morning, telling reporters after the discussion that the House is “going to resolve the issue.”
“It’s an issue of first impression for the Congress,” he said during his weekly news conference. “This is an unprecedented matter, so we’re going to, we’ll find a resolution that solves the problem.”
Johnson said House Republicans welcome “all new members with open arms.” He vowed to build “consensus” around Mace’s push, and said the House will “accommodate the needs of every single person.”
“I believe it’s a command we treat all persons with dignity and respect,” he said. “I’m not going to engage in silly debates about this.”
Mace said she had spoken to the speaker about the resolution Monday, and that Johnson would consider adding it into the rules package that dictates how the House floor and complex operates during the 119th Congress. She said that if Johnson didn’t ultimately include it, she would file a privileged resolution next year that would force a vote on the matter within 48 hours of its introduction in the new Congress.
The House votes to approve the rules Jan. 3, shortly after members are sworn into office by the newly elected speaker of the House. They are typically adopted on party lines, and a majority of Republicans will have to support it, given their razor-thin majority and Democrats’ refusal to help approve controversial conservative provisions.
Questioned about the issue, Rep. Tom Cole (R-Oklahoma), who recently chaired the House Rules Committee, said Tuesday that he was “not going to get involved in bathroom debates.”
Currently, Mace’s resolution is not privileged, meaning the House does not have to immediately vote on it. Even if the resolution were to be adopted this year, it would have to be reintroduced and passed in 2025 to be in effect for the 119th Congress.
Earlier this month, McBride made history when Delaware elected her to succeed Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester (D), who is now headed to the Senate. In her victory speech, McBride, a 34-year-old state senator, said America’s democracy “is big enough for all of us.” Her rise marks a consequential moment for the country’s trans community, and it comes amid escalating violence against trans people and efforts by state legislatures to limit their rights.
Republican lawmakers nationwide – in both statehouses and the U.S. Capitol – have pushed to limit trans rights, and fights over bathroom access have broken out across the country. Conservative lawmakers in virtually every state have introduced additional measures to restrict gender transition care or block trans girls from participating in sports.
As she left the House Republican conference meeting Tuesday, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) said the men in the GOP conference – including Johnson – should “be defending” GOP women who want to ban trans individuals from bathrooms. “America is fed up with the trans ideology being shoved into our face. Men are not women,” Greene said.
While Greene has repeatedly misgendered McBride and used her birth name while speaking about Mace’s resolution – a move anti-trans individuals use to attack trans people – Mace referred to McBride with her chosen pronouns of “she” and “her,” and used her chosen name.
House Democrats have quickly come to McBride’s defense.
“She just got to Congress. She’s going to use whatever restroom she needs to use. It’s just sad that we have to have this conversation,” Rep. Robert Garcia (D-California) said.
Rep. Becca Balint (D-Vermont) wrote on X: “There’s no bottom to the cruelty. We have an obligation to push back. When we allow attacks on someone’s basic human dignity, we’re all made more cruel.”
House Democratic Whip Katherine Clark (D-Massachusetts) told reporters that it wasn’t a “great start” for the new Republican House majority to kick off the 119th Congress by talking about “where one member out of 435” is going to use the bathroom.
“The American people say: Mind your own business about where people do their business,” Clark said, arguing that what voters do want Republicans to talk about is the economy, housing and child care.
Mace appears to have shifted on the issue. In 2021 – before her district was redrawn to be more GOP-friendly – Mace supported a Republican alternative to the Equality Act called the “Fairness for All Act.” In defending her choice to back the bill, Mace said at the time that she “strongly” supports “LGBTQ rights and equality.”
“No one should be discriminated against,” she said then.
On Tuesday, Mace cited those credentials as the reason she is pushing to bar McBride from using the women’s bathrooms on Capitol Hill.
“I voted for gay marriage not once, but twice. I had voted for protections for LGBTQ,” she said. “But I have a big fat red line when it comes to men and women’s private spaces.”
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Emily Wax-Thibodeaux contributed to this report.