Holcomb’s stance on the transgender issue is wildly out of sync with that of his state’s voters.
Holcomb’s stance on the transgender issue is wildly out of sync with that of his state’s voters.
O n March 21, Indiana governor Eric Holcomb, a Republican, vetoed a ban on biological males in girls’ sports. Holcomb was the second red-state governor to veto such legislation, following South Dakota governor Kristi Noem’s controversial veto of a women’s sports bill in her state almost exactly one year prior. Just 24 hours later, Utah’s Spencer Cox became the third, vetoing a similar bill sent to his desk by the Republican state legislature.
The backlash to all three Republican vetoes signals a new appetite for aggressive action on the transgender issue in the GOP. In the face of harsh conservative criticism, Noem introduced new legislation aimed at restricting athletic participation based on biological sex, and the Utah state legislature moved to override Governor Cox’s veto by overwhelming margins just a few days after it was issued. Indiana GOP leaders have vowed to override Holcomb’s veto when they meet for a special session on May 24. Republican politicians representing the Hoosier State in Congress were quick to signal their support for that override. “These are just excuses on his part,” Congressman Jim Banks (R., Ind.) said of Holcomb’s supposed concerns about the likelihood of litigation. “Hoosiers aren’t buying it.”
A new poll of Indiana voters from the American Principles Project (APP), a social-conservative advocacy group that has been at the forefront of many state-level legislative battles surrounding transgenderism and gender ideology, seems to confirm Banks’s assertion. The poll, which was conducted from March 28 to April 3 and focused primarily on transgender issues, found 42.1 percent “strongly disapproved” of Holcomb’s veto of the ban on biological males in girls’ sports, and 11 percent “somewhat disapproved.” By contrast, 11.3 percent “somewhat approved,” and 28.1 percent “strongly approved.” The survey sampled 1,022 likely voters in Indiana.
On the broader issue of transgender athletes in women’s sports, 54.4 percent of polled Indiana voters “strongly supported legislation that banned biologically male students that identify as transgender girls from competing in girls’ sports programs at Indiana K-12 public schools,” while 10.1 “somewhat supported,” 7.7 percent “somewhat opposed” and 19.5 “strongly opposed.” At the college level, 56.4 percent “strongly supported” a ban, while 10.3 percent “somewhat supported,” 8.4 percent “somewhat opposed,” and 17.2 percent “strongly opposed.”
Notably, 77.4 percent of poll respondents had heard of Lia Thomas, the biological male whose recent victory in the NCAA women’s swimming championship marked the highest-profile case to date of a transgender competitor in women’s sports. Of the more than two-thirds of respondents who were aware of Thomas, 65.6 percent said they “strongly opposed” the NCAA’s decision to allow transgender athletes like Lia Thomas to compete in swimming against other women, even if they are biologically male,” while 8.9 percent “somewhat opposed.” Fourteen percent “strongly supported” Thomas’s ability to compete in the women’s division, while 7.8 percent “somewhat supported.”
On other gender-ideology-related issues, 46.7 percent of respondents “strongly supported legislation that banned teaching kindergarten through third-grade students about ‘sexual orientation’ and ‘gender identity’ in the classroom,” analogous to Florida’s recent Parental Rights in Education Bill, and 9.6 percent “somewhat supported” the proposal. On the other side, 9.5 percent “somewhat opposed,” and 26.9 percent “strongly opposed.” Similarly, 54.9 percent “strongly opposed” the state of Indiana allowing “children under the age of 18 who identify as transgender to take puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones, and undergo physical sex change surgeries,” while 10.2 percent “somewhat opposed.” In contrast, just 10.5 percent “strongly supported” and 10.5 percent “somewhat supported” legal sex changes for minors.
Taken in their totality, the numbers suggest that Holcomb’s stance on the transgender issue is wildly out of sync with that of his state’s voters. As APP president Terry Schilling wrote in a memo released about the poll, “huge majorities of voters” in the Hoosier State “support doing even more to protect Indiana’s children.” That includes taking action on the transgender issues listed above, but also majority support for “requiring pornography sites to verify the age of their users in order to prevent minors from accessing obscene material,” and “creating a right of action for parents to sue porn sites that distribute obscenity to their children,” as Schilling points out. In other words, protecting children isn’t just the morally right thing to do — in red states, at least, it’s the politically prudent move.