Ohio moves to 'Protect All Students' by banning use of opposite sex bathrooms

The Ohio Senate approved Senate Bill 104 – the Protect All Students Act – that would mandate students to use the bathroom associated with their biological sex and not their gender identity. The bill passed 24-7, with Republicans supporting it and Democrats opposing it and will ensure students at the primary, secondary and post-secondary level use a bathroom or locker room in accordance with the sex assigned to them at birth, CNN reported.

Gov. Mike DeWine (R-OH) is expected to sign the bill that would also prohibit any-gender bathrooms or locker facilities. The policy would not apply to school employees, the disabled or children under 10 who require the assistance of a family member or guardian. Advocates of the bill argue that gender-neutral bathrooms have allowed for the rape of female students and allowing biological males into female bathrooms is intimidating for girls and women.

DeWine is expected to ask for a legal review of the bill before he commits to signing it, the Associated Press reported. “We have no new comment,” DeWine spokesperson Dan Tierney told CNN on Thursday. “While the bill has passed, it has not been delivered to our office yet for signature.”

DeWine’s support for the bill is not absolute. In 2023, he vetoed a bill to ban sex- change operations for minors. The legislature had to override his veto. “Today is a huge victory for children and families in Ohio,” said the group’s policy director David Mahan in a statement Wednesday, calling it “common-sense legislation.”

LGBTQ activists have targeted other bills like this for defeat, seeing them as an attack on perceived transgender rights. “Senate Bill 104 is a cruel invasion of students’ rights to privacy, which could result in unwarranted governmental disclosures of private, personal information,” Jocelyn Rosnick, policy director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio, said Wednesday in a statement.