Updated March 10, 2025 at 05:00 AM ET
On February 28, Iowa's governor signed a bill that removes protections for transgender and nonbinary people from the state's civil rights law, in a move that opponents say is unprecedented.
Senate File 418 strikes from the Iowa Civil Rights Act's list of protected classes the phrase "gender identity," which legislators added 18 years ago.
In a statement, Gov. Kim Reynolds, a Republican, said that the civil rights law had previously blurred the lines between the sexes, and that defining that line is critical for the cause of equal protection.
"What this bill does accomplish is to strengthen protections for women and girls," she said, mentioning sports and restrooms. "I believe that it is the right thing to do."
The LGBTQ+ rights group Lambda Legal called it "the first time a state would remove existing statutory protections based on gender identity."
Aside from changing the civil rights code, the bill defines sex as either male or female, assigned at birth, and synonymous with gender. That language echoes an executive order President Trump signed on his first day in office. Iowa's new law also removes Iowans' ability to change the sex listed on their birth certificate.
The law takes effect July 1.
A parent reacts
Matt McIver of Des Moines, Iowa, is a parent of two children, including a transgender teenager.
"I used to think that once rights were secured, they were safe. But we've seen that that's not true in this country," he said.
McIver is on the board of One Iowa Action, the advocacy branch of One Iowa, a group that works to advance LGBTQ+ causes in the state. He told NPR's Leila Fadel that the loss of civil rights for one protected group concerns everyone.
"This is an attack on the fundamental rights of Iowans, and it is an attack that undermines our state's motto, which is, 'Our liberties we prize and our rights we will maintain,' " he said.
McIver first spoke to Morning Edition in 2023, when Iowa banned gender-affirming care for trans youth. Since then, he has become more cautious about speaking publicly about his family.
"This is a less safe state than it was even when you and I spoke two years ago," he told Fadel.
Effects of the bill
McIver said the bill leaves Iowans like his child vulnerable to discrimination.
"It means that you can be evicted from your apartment simply for being transgender or being believed to be transgender," he said, also raising that people could be denied a credit card or fired from a job for their gender identity.
The bill's sponsor, Jason Schultz, a Republican state senator, called such concerns "dramatic" in debate at the state Capitol.
Supporters of the bill point out that most states do not explicitly list "gender identity" as a protected group and lament that a district court ruling, in part citing the Iowa Civil Rights Act, overturned the state's ban on using Medicaid to cover gender-affirming surgeries, as the Des Moines Register reported.
Schultz said the civil rights law had to change, because it could be used to overturn recent laws that ban trans women and girls from women's athletics and block trans students from using school restrooms and changing areas that match their gender identity. Iowa was among a wave of Republican-led states to pass these laws in the past few years.
"All these legal protections are at risk due to the inclusion of the words 'gender identity' in our code," Schultz said.
The national context
The move aligns with the Trump administration's changes at the federal level. One of the president's first executive orders recognized only two sexes, male and female, and directed agencies to remove references to gender identity from official forms, among other things. In a separate order, Trump told agencies to take steps to curtail gender-affirming care for people under 19 years old.
The effects of the new policies have been wide-ranging. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has dropped litigation against gender discrimination. Some transgender and intersex travelers fear they may be forced to out themselves when they present their new passports. And some medical institutions have stopped offering gender-affirming care to young people.
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