Kansas GOP passed transgender bathroom bill with no input from public | Opinion
Contempt.
Let’s just go ahead and call last week’s ”gut and go” passage of an anti-transgender bathroom bill by the Kansas Legislature’s GOP supermajority what it is: an act of contempt.
Contempt for transgender people.
Contempt for the Democrats they work with.
And contempt for the Kansans they ostensibly serve.
Why else would legislative Republicans feel the need to suddenly bypass all their usual processes to get the bill passed on an emergency basis?
They have a supermajority in both chambers of the Legislature, after all. The session is still relatively young. The bill was going to pass whether they took the long way — the way that lets ordinary Kansans have a say on the laws that govern them — or the short way.
Republicans took the short way. That was a choice.
So it’s reasonable to conclude that legislators were trying to make a point that couldn’t be made merely by passing the bill. They seemingly wanted to demonstrate that they don’t have to listen to their fellow Kansans on divisive issues — and, indeed, they absolutely won’t if they don’t want to.
Like I said: contempt.
A rushed, flawed process
The Star’s Matthew Kelly provided a great video overview of the process that resulted in the bill’s passage. Here’s what happened:
- A public hearing on the original bill — to require trans Kansans to use their birth gender on state IDs — was held Jan. 13 with less than 24 hours’ notice. That was a clear attempt to avoid public comment on the matter, but more than 200 opponents managed to submit testimony.
- Last Monday, state Rep. Bob Lewis offered an amendment to require trans Kansans to use bathrooms corresponding to their birth sex in government buildings. Democrats reasonably said that such a major addition to the bill shouldn’t be adopted without public feedback. Republicans moved forward anyway.
- After that, state Rep. Susan Humphries moved to ensure the bill wouldn’t receive a hearing in the Kansas Senate — using a legislative maneuver to “gut” a completely unrelated bill passed last year by the Senate and replace it with the trans bathroom language.
- Finally, House Republicans suspended their chamber’s standing rules to force an immediate, emergency vote on the bill rather than follow the usual practice of waiting a full day to give their approval.
To pass the bathroom bill, in other words, Republicans repeatedly short-circuited the legislature’s usual practices of allowing public commentary, public scrutiny and the possibility of cooler heads prevailing.
Why? Because they could, apparently.
“All the rules and procedures were followed,” Humphries said, in remarks quoted by Sunflower State Journal. “They might be distasteful to some, but they were followed.”
Hiding the ball, again
It’s here where I’m going to say “I told you so.”
Just last month — as the Kansas Legislature’s annual 90-day session was getting underway — I warned that the GOP politicians sure seemed inclined toward secrecy in doing state business. They started the year, after all, with the surprise hiring of Emporia State University’s controversial former president to advise them on slashing the state’s public university budgets.
“Kansas Republicans,” I said then, “sure like to hide the ball.”
And, well, point proven once again.
Which is why — even if you aren’t much sympathetic to LGBT Kansans or care that Republicans are seemingly intent on driving those poor folks out of the state — you should care about what happened last week.
Legislators are supposed to serve the public. Every end-run around public scrutiny and public comment is a betrayal of the fundamental compact between the citizenry and the folks they elect to serve them.
“Kansans, whether you agree with them or disagree with them on this issue, deserve to be heard,” House Minority Leader Brandon Woodard of Lenexa said during last week’s debate.
Republicans clearly disagree. They don’t want to hear from Kansans — on certain issues, at least — and they don’t care if you know.
That’s the very definition of contempt.
This story was originally published February 3, 2026 at 5:13 AM with the headline "Kansas GOP passed transgender bathroom bill with no input from public | Opinion."
