Kansas governor vetoes anti-trans bathroom bill, citing ‘numerous and significant consequences’
Gov. Laura Kelly vetoed a "bathroom bill" on Feb. 13, 2026, calling the bill "poorly drafted." (Photo by Thad Allton for Kansas Reflector)
TOPEKA — Gov. Laura Kelly vetoed a controversial bill that forces transgender people to use bathrooms that match their biological sex at birth, saying the poorly drafted legislation would have far-reaching consequences.
The Democratic governor now hands House Substitute for Senate Bill 244 back to a Legislature that has enough Republican votes to override her veto and put the bill into law.
The bill requires government entities to police bathrooms and other private spaces in their buildings, and levies fines against the governing body for failing to comply. It also sets up escalating penalties for individuals who use a bathroom that doesn’t match their sex at birth.
In a statement Friday, Kelly cited multiple situations that would be affected by HB 244.
“If your grandfather is in a nursing home in a shared room, as a granddaughter, you would not be able to visit him,” Kelly said. “If your sister is living in a dorm at K-State, as a brother, you would not be able to visit her in her room.”
Kelly said she vetoed the bill because of those “numerous and significant consequences.”
“I believe the Legislature should stay out of the business of telling Kansans how to go to the bathroom and instead stay focused on how to make life more affordable for Kansans,” she said.
House Speaker Dan Hawkins, R-Wichita, said he didn’t understand why the governor would veto a “common sense” bill.
“That’s not extreme — it’s basic clarity, truth, and dignity,” he said in a statement. “Kansans expect their laws to reflect reality and protect privacy. Instead of standing with the overwhelming majority of Kansans on this issue, the Governor chose to appease her most radical supporters at the cost of women and girls in our state.”
Senate President Ty Masterson said he was surprised to see Kelly “turn her back on women.”
“Sadly, our governor has decided she will side with they/them over simple, scientific truth,” Masterson said in a statement. “Kansans need not worry — the Kansas Senate will restore sanity, and override her veto.”
House Speaker Dan Hawkins, R-Wichita, talks with colleagues during the Jan. 28, 2026, debate on anti-trans legislation in the House. (Photo by Sherman Smith/Kansas Reflector)
No public input
The House and Senate, through a series of procedural devices, passed SB 244 without allowing public input on the bathroom portion of the bill.
The legislation originated in the House Judiciary Committee as House Bill 2426, which originally dealt with gender markers on driver’s licenses and birth certificates. Despite little advance notice of the hearing on the bill, more than 200 people opposed HB 2426 through written testimony.
A week later, the committee debated the bill with no advance notice. Rep. Bob Lewis, R-Garden City, proposed an amendment to ban transgender people from using the bathroom of their choice and prohibiting anyone from taking a child older than 10 into a bathroom for the opposite sex.
In a “gut and go” move, the committee then placed HB 2426 into SB 244, which was completely unrelated. The move allowed the Senate, following passage by the House, to hold an immediate vote without a committee hearing first.
Numerous Democrats blasted the lack of transparency in the process during a six-hour House debate.
In a statement Friday, House Minority Leader Brandon Woodard said SB 244 was a failure of “process and priorities.”
“The bill was rushed through the Legislature without meaningful public input or debate. Beyond its flawed process, the legislation targets a small and vulnerable group of Kansans while creating sweeping and unintended consequences for communities across our state,” he said in a statement.
Like Kelly, Woodard expressed concern for the far-reaching implications of SB 244. It would affect shared hospital, nursing home, rehabilitation and treatment rooms, dorm rooms and sporting events, he said.
“This bill is bad legislation and has bad unintended consequences,” Woodard said.
Local government officials have said the bill could cost local governments millions of dollars to implement.
House Minority Leader Brandon Woodard talks to reporters during a Jan. 15, 2026, news conference in Senate Minority Leader Dinah Sykes’ office at the Statehouse in Topeka. (Photo by Sherman Smith/Kansas Reflector)
‘Extreme and harmful’
Harper Seldin, a senior staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union, said the Kansas bill stands out as “particularly pernicious” and different from similar legislation that has passed across the country.
“I think this bill is particularly extreme and harmful. It’s unique in that it contains these escalating criminal penalties against individual people, as well as this private right of action,” he said. “I think also the provision regarding municipal liability is particularly harmful, because it puts the price of this kind of discrimination on local taxpayers in a way that feels deeply unjust.”
SB 244 sets an initial penalty if a local government entity doesn’t comply with the bill at $25,000, with penalties escalating to $125,000 after subsequent violations. City and county officials have expressed concern about the bill’s lack of clarity.
Seldin said the language in the bill is confusing for parents, who must decide whether they have to leave their 10-year-old son standing alone outside the restroom if they are using the women’s room.
“This bill is particularly poorly worded and constructed in ways that are going to create confusion and anxiety, and certainly real material harm in the event it’s enforced,” he said.
Seldin said Kansas legislators, no matter their feelings about transgender people, should consider whether the bill should be passed in its current form.
“I think that’s exactly the intent of bills like this, including the poor wording, which is to create the kind of fear and uncertainty that causes trans folks to self police and over comply, even in restrooms where they are perfectly permitted to be,” Seldin said.
Although there has been a “wave” of restroom bans across the country, Seldin said it is a solution in search of a problem.
“Trans people are much more likely to be the victims of violence than than they are to be causing it,” he said. “Public restrooms are not a site of a lot of violence or harm. I think that the assumption of these bills is that trans people are unworthy to be in society, or that there’s something dangerous about us, because we don’t conform to ideas of what men and women are. But there’s no evidence to support that.”
Matthew Neumann speaks to Kansas Reflector reporter Anna Kaminski on Feb. 6, 2026, at the Statehouse. He is executive director of the LGBTQ Foundation of Kansas. (Photo by Sherman Smith/Kansas Reflector)
‘Government-sanctioned harassment’
Human Rights Campaign president Kelley Robinson said SB 244’s focus on attacking transgender people is “appalling.”
“SB 244 is about invading privacy, forcing people into the wrong bathrooms, stripping transgender Kansans of accurate IDs, and inviting government-sanctioned harassment — all pushed through using cynical procedural tricks to silence public opposition,” Robinson said in a statement. “Shameful policies like this are part and parcel of a national right-wing anti-LGBTQ+ campaign, and they don’t make anyone safer.”
Brittany Jones, president of Kansas Family Voice, said the legislation supports the “Kansas Women’s Bill of Rights” by ensuring women and girls have private, sex-specific spaces.
“Most kindergartners know the difference between a boy and a girl and can tell you which restroom each should use, yet the governor of our state cannot seem to recognize the distinction,” she said in a written statement.
About 50 transgender people and their allies gathered Feb. 6 at the Statehouse to use the bathroom. Calling the action a “pee-in,” they demonstrated how the bill would require people who look like men to use the women’s room, and vice versa.
“With everything going on in our government right now, why was Kansas’ main priority to target marginalized communities?” asked Matthew Neumann, executive director of the LGBTQ Foundation of Kansas.