Representative Nancy Mace of South Carolina introduced legislation that would ban transgender women from using women’s restrooms on Capitol Hill just as the first transgender woman is about to be sworn into Congress.
Mace, a Republican serving in her second term, introduced the legislation on Monday evening. The bill would prohibit members of Congress, officers and employees of the House of Representatives from “using single-sex facilities other than those corresponding to their biological sex.”
Earlier this month, Delaware elected Sarah McBride to be its sole member of Congress, making her the first openly transgender woman to serve in either chamber of Congress.
“Biological men do not belong in private women’s spaces,” Mace said in a post on X/Twitter. “Period. Full stop. End of story.”
The legislation would require the Sergeant at Arms of the House to enforce the resolution.
In response, McBride, who served in Delaware’s state senate, criticized the legislation.
“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 posted on X/Twitter. “We should be focused on bringing down the cost of housing, health care, and child care, not manufacturing culture wars.”
The legislation comes as anti-trans legislation from Republicans has proliferated at the state level. On the presidential level, president-elect Donald Trump attacked vice president Kamala Harris for supporting tax-payer funded gender-affirming care for prison inmates and for letting trans women compete in girls’ sports. The advertisement had the tagline “Kamala is for They/Them” adding “President Trump is for you.”
Senator Ted Cruz also ran similar ads in his successful re-election campaign against Representative Colin Allred.
In the same vein, some Democrats like Representatives Tom Suozzi of New York and Seth Moulton have argued that Democrats needed to back away from trans youth playing in women’s sports.
But other Democrats have said blame shouldn’t be directed at transgender people.
“The Democratic Party needs to do some serious introspection to understand what went wrong and why our message isn’t resonating or reaching people. But one thing’s for sure — blaming trans kids isn’t the answer,” Reprsentative Sara Jacobs said on X/Twitter in the aftermath of the election.
