Republican Gov. Eric Holcomb vetoed a bill on Monday that attempts to ban transgender youth from sports in Indiana; gives cisgender students the power to potentially be ‘compensated’ with up to $1000 for playing with trans athletes; safeguards anti-trans policies by not allowing schools to challenge them.

In his veto letter, Holocomb states that the bill “falls short” in providing a consistent statewide policy for “fairness in K-12 sports” — a misnomer used in these legislative attacks.

He adds: “The presumption of the policy laid out in HEA 1041 is that there is an existing problem in K-12 sports in Indiana that requires further state government intervention. It implies that the goals of consistency and fairness in competitive female sports are not currently being met. After thorough review, I find no evidence to support either claim even if I support the effort overall.”

Despite this, Indiana legislators have enough votes to override the veto, and could potentially add the state to the list of eleven others that have banned trans athletes from participating in school sports, which has detrimental impacts to how all youth experience sports.

The harm created by this bills extends far beyond sports – 85 percent of transgender and nonbinary youth said in a poll, that their mental health was negatively impacted by last year’s record-breaking legislative attacks on their identities.

“My wife basically has said — and I agree with her — that my kid’s mental health is more important than your kid’s trophy,” Nathaniel Clawson, the father of a 9-year-old trans child named Kirin affected by this bill, told WTHR.

Excluding trans girls and femme youth from participating in sports has negative outcomes for all youth. It reproduces patriarchal concepts of toxic masculinity that associate femininity with fragility.

The sex and gender binary are social constructs that restrict everyone regardless of their gender identity.

There is no equity if gender is defined by patriarchal systems that are designed to restrict everyone. There is no equity if women who are trans are excluded. These bills are an attack on all youth, women and sports.