Our Liberties We Prize
Last week Iowa made history, but not the kind you’d put on a postcard.
On Friday, February 28, Governor Reynolds signed Senate File 418 into law, making Iowa the first state in the nation to remove a protected class from its civil rights code. The bill eliminated gender identity as a protected class, rewrote the definition of sex in state law, and replaced mentions of gender identity with “gender theory.”
If you tuned into the House debate, you probably noticed a recurring theme. Every single House Democrat found a way to quote Iowa’s state motto, “Our liberties we prize, and our rights we will maintain”, in their floor speeches. The phrase was repeated so often that if someone had turned it into a drinking game, they likely wouldn’t have survived the afternoon. But the repetition wasn’t just rhetoric. It was a deliberate response to what many saw as a fundamental betrayal of Iowa’s long-standing commitment to civil rights.
There was an attempt to soften the bill. Ten House Republicans introduced an amendment that would have preserved transgender protections while keeping the bill’s definitions section. However, after being attacked by conservative media outlets, the amendment was withdrawn before it could even be debated. Of the ten who sponsored it, only two ultimately opposed the bill.
Debate on the chamber floors was heated. Senator Jason Schultz, who managed the bill, argued that Iowa’s transgender protections conflicted with recent Republican-backed laws on bathroom access and women’s sports. He framed SF 418 as a necessary correction. Senator Bennett, however, called it a “shameful rebuke” of Iowa’s history, while Senator Blake warned it set a “dangerous precedent” by stripping rights from an already marginalized community.
In the House, Representative Steve Holt framed the bill as a victory for women’s rights, while House Minority Leader Jennifer Konfrst countered that it ignored the rights of some women while privileging others. Representative Wichtendahl, spoke from personal experience, highlighting the devastating impact the bill will have on transgender Iowans, including herself. Her remarks brought the entire gallery to tears. In a rare moment of defiance, House Democrats broke floor rules to give her a standing ovation. LGBTQ advocates at the Capitol argued that the Democrats showed more courage just by clapping than those 10 amendment sponsors had hours before.
Outside the chamber, thousands of Iowans gathered at the Capitol all week for a four day long protest, begging legislators to reject the bill. Faith leaders, including pastors and clergy from across the state, held signs reminding lawmakers that “Trans Lives R Sacred.”
Despite the public outcry, SF 418 passed along party lines in the Senate on Thursday, 33-15. A few hours later in the House, the vote was 60-36, with five Republicans, Bergan, Harris, Lohse, Mommsen, and Sieck, breaking party loyalty to vote against it.
Governor Reynolds signed it into law the next day. In her statement, she claimed the law “safeguards the rights of women and girls” and insisted it merely aligns Iowa with federal civil rights law. However, most civil rights laws expand protections, not remove them.
If there’s one good thing about this bill, it proves that government can work “efficiently” when it wants to. It only took eight days for Republican lawmakers to codify that an entire group of Iowans is not wanted in this state.
With SF 418 now on the books, Iowa joins 28 other states that lack legal protections for transgender individuals. The consequences will be felt in employment, housing, education, and public spaces. Legal challenges are inevitable, and advocacy groups have already signaled their intent to fight back.
But for now, Iowa holds a unique distinction. We are now the first state to roll back civil rights protections in modern history and the only state where Republicans were too busy playing bingo during debate to listen to their colleagues and constituents.
Not exactly a tourism slogan, but here we are.
This article was written by Chloe Gayer, part of the LWVIA lobby team.