When the Legislature convenes Monday for its third special session, the main order of business is redrawing the state’s political boundaries for the next decade’s worth of elections.
But tucked into Gov. Greg Abbott’s agenda, again, is a bill that would bar transgender children from playing in school sports that align with their gender identity. Sen. Charles Perry, R-Lubbock, says his bill — which already failed to pass during the 87th legislative session and the two special sessions that followed — is about protecting competitive balance for cisgender girls, or those whose gender identity matches the one they were assigned at birth.
It is just the latest in a history of attempts to curtail the rights of transgender Texans, but for longtime advocates in Houston’s transgender community, it only reinforces their conviction in their causes and each other.
Earlier this summer, Abbott successfuly pushed to have gender-affirming surgery for children redefined as “genital mutilation,” a characterization that goes against the longstanding wisdom of medical professionals. In 2015, Houston voters struck down the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance
