{"id":495145,"date":"2026-02-28T06:54:18","date_gmt":"2026-02-28T06:54:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/495145\/"},"modified":"2026-02-28T06:54:18","modified_gmt":"2026-02-28T06:54:18","slug":"two-transgender-men-sue-kansas-over-dehumanizing-drivers-license-law-kansas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/495145\/","title":{"rendered":"Two transgender men sue Kansas over \u2018dehumanizing\u2019 driver\u2019s license law | Kansas"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two transgender men are suing Kansas over a new law that invalidated their driver\u2019s licenses<\/a> and about 1,700 others for reflecting people\u2019s gender identities and not their sex assigned at birth, arguing that the measure is \u201cdehumanizing\u201d.<\/p>\n

The men filed their case Thursday, the same day the law took effect, and argue that it violates rights to privacy, personal autonomy and due legal process guaranteed by the Kansas<\/a> state constitution. The men also are challenging the law\u2019s tough, new enforcement provisions for the state\u2019s three-year-old policy of barring transgender people from using public restrooms or other single-sex facilities associated with their gender identities.<\/p>\n

The men are asking Catherine Theisen, Douglas county\u2019s district judge, to block the law, which also invalidated about 1,800 transgender people\u2019s birth certificates. The county is home to the main University of Kansas campus and is a liberal bastion in a generally conservative state.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Kansas constitution prohibits the Kansas legislature\u2019s targeting of transgender individuals for this discriminatory and dehumanizing treatment,\u201d the lawsuit says.<\/p>\n

The state supreme court declared in 2019 that the Kansas bill of rights confers and protects a right to bodily autonomy \u2013 a decision that protected abortion rights.<\/p>\n

The new law was enacted on 18 February when Republicans, who hold a supermajority in the legislature, overrode a veto by Democratic governor Laura Kelly. She appointed Theisen to the bench in 2022.<\/p>\n

A 2023 state law, also enacted<\/a> over Kelly\u2019s veto, defined male and female by a person\u2019s \u201cbiological reproductive system\u201d at birth. The Kansas supreme court hasn\u2019t yet reviewed it.<\/p>\n

The law enacted more recently calls for stiff fines for cities, counties, public schools and state agencies that don\u2019t restrict transgender people\u2019s use of facilities, as well as fines and criminal prosecutions for transgender people who violate it. People can also sue trans individuals over alleged violations.<\/p>\n

Republican legislators argued that the new law will protect girls and women and often described transgender women and girls as male.<\/p>\n

\u201cKansans expect clarity, not confusion,\u201d statehouse speaker Dan Hawkins, a Wichita Republican, said after the law was enacted. \u201cThey expect leadership, not surrender to radical activists.\u201d<\/p>\n

The law bars any \u201csex\u201d listing on driver\u2019s licenses and birth certificates other than the one assigned at birth and invalidates existing records that don\u2019t comply. The state has started notifying transgender people by mail that their licenses are invalid and they must get new ones immediately.<\/p>\n

At least eight other states don\u2019t allow transgender people to change one or both documents \u2013 but only Kansas has invalidated documents that were previously changed.<\/p>\n

The two men suing over the new law are from Lawrence \u2013 about 40 miles (64km ) west of Kansas City \u2013 and represented by American Civil Liberties Union attorneys. They\u2019re identified as Daniel Doe and Matthew Moe, saying they fear discrimination, harassment and violence if they don\u2019t remain anonymous.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two transgender men are suing Kansas over a new law that invalidated their driver\u2019s licenses and about 1,700…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":495146,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-495145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=495145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495145\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/495146"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=495145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=495145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=495145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}