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About 100 people lined the committee room and halls of the Legislative Office Building to protest a House bill that would allow the separation of people by biological sex in certain circumstances. -
Elizabeth Goodhue of Peterborough talks with Rep. Jonah Wheeler after a League of Women Voters listening session in March, which was dominated by discussion of his vote to support the bathroom bill.
Gov. Kelly Ayotte vetoed a bill that would have allowed the separation of bathrooms, locker rooms, sports and correctional facilities by biological sex, calling the Republican-led effort “overly broad and impractical to enforce.”
With the veto, announced Tuesday, Ayotte follows in the footsteps of her predecessor, Gov. Chris Sununu, who shot down the same bill last year. Ayotte, however, went a step further by acknowledging what she views as “important and legitimate” concerns surrounding privacy and safety when biological males have access to spaces like female locker rooms.
“While I believe that the legislature should address this serious issue, it must be done in a thoughtful and narrow way that protects the privacy, safety and rights of all New Hampshire citizens,” Ayotte said in a press release announcing her decision on Tuesday. “I have concerns about the broadness of this bill, the unintended impacts accompanying its implementation and that it will spur a plethora of litigation against local communities and businesses.”
The veto marks the effort’s second defeat in two years. In his dismissal, Sununu said the bill sought to solve problems he didn’t see happening in New Hampshire.
The bill, proposed by Wilton Republican Rep. Jim Kofalt, drew passionate public input from Granite Staters as lawmakers weighed the safety, privacy and rights of women and transgender people — and whether those could coexist.
“It’s very disappointing,” Kofalt said of Ayotte’s veto.
In his view, the bill would have given schools and businesses flexibility over their own policies while respecting everyone involved. Though his bill has now been vetoed twice, Kofalt said he has every intention to keep trying. He plans to work with the governor’s office to see what she might find more “agreeable.”
Kofalt’s proposal would have also prohibited transgender athletes from competing in school sports, an effort that Sununu already signed into law last year.
Two New Hampshire athletes are challenging that law in federal court, and Ayotte said she will “vigorously defend it.”
Republicans like Kofalt had argued that the expanded civil rights laws Sununu signed in 2018, which added gender identity as a class protected against discrimination, created a loophole that allows non-transgender people to enter spaces that “practically speaking, they should not have access to.”
“Women are humans as well,” Sen. Regina Birdsell, a Republican from Hampstead, said during debate on the bill. “They have rights, and they have a right to their own privacy. Women are being marginalized in this environment, and as far as I’m concerned, this has to stop.”
During debates and votes earlier this year, Democrats in the Legislature spoke at length about their concerns that the bill, House Bill 148, would have discriminated against and posed safety risks to transgender people.
“We’re grateful that today New Hampshire chose to protect the rights and dignity of our transgender neighbors,” Exeter Rep. Alexis Simpson, the House Democratic Leader, said in a statement in response to the governor’s veto.
In the House, Reps. Jonah Wheeler and Peter Leishman, both of whom represent Peterborough and Sharon, were the only two Democrats to vote for the bill. In a speech on the House floor, Wheeler said: “The consent of one person cannot stand for the consent of another person, and if there are women who feel unsafe, if there are women who feel like their space has become not private, then we should listen to those women. Just because a small segment of the population would like those policies to accommodate them over women doesn’t mean that we here today can do that.”
Wheeler’s vote dominated discussion at a League of Women Voters listening session the next week that he and Executive Councilor Karen Liot Hill attended. While some of the speakers thanked Wheeler for his vote, most said they felt betrayed.
The Legislature will have an opportunity later this year to override Ayotte’s veto, which would require a two-thirds majority in both the House and Senate.
Charlotte Matherly is the statehouse reporter for the Concord Monitor and Monadnock Ledger-Transcript in partnership with Report for America. Follow her on X at @charmatherly, subscribe to her Capital Beat newsletter and send her an email at cmatherly@cmonitor.com.
