Family of trans college student flees Idaho after state passes draconian anti-trans law

The parents of a young trans woman in Idaho say that they’re leaving their state after it passed a law to criminalize trans people who use the restroom.

“Obviously, this law is a disaster for families like ours,” Michael Devitt, the father of 20-year-old Eve, wrote in a letter notifying his patients that his physical therapy practice would be shutting down. “We can no longer take a road trip across our beloved state, or even enjoy a family night out at a restaurant, or a movie, without running the risk of Eve being charged and sent to a prison merely for using the facilities.”

The law he’s referring to is H.B. 752, which Gov. Brad Little (R) signed into law on March 31, the Trans Day of Visibility. The hostile law makes it a criminal offense for trans people to use the restroom that aligns with their gender identity, even in private businesses. Multiple offenses could get a trans person life in prison.

While several states have passed bathroom bills, Idaho is one of only four states – along with Florida, Kansas, and Utah – to introduce criminal penalties for using the restroom.

Eve Devitt, who is attending college in New York, testified against a different transphobic bill several years ago.

“Since I started estrogen almost three whole years ago, my mental health has gotten significantly better,” she told the Idaho House Judiciary, Rules, and Administration committee in 2023. “I’ve been able to get myself off of a cliff that I wasn’t sure if I would ever find myself off of. I feel so much better and more complete with myself.”

But today the Devitts say they’ve had enough, comparing their state to an abusive partner.

“We say ‘We’re in an abusive relationship with the state of Idaho’ — all people with transgender relatives, or all transgender people. And you always think, ‘Oh, they’ll stop hitting me.’ But they’re not gonna,” Michael Devitt told the Idaho Capital-Sun. He said that H.B. 752’s penalties for multiple offenses are more than the prison sentence someone in the state could get for manslaughter.

“I mean, there are all kinds of things you can do in Idaho that will get you prison time that are less than the second offense for using the bathroom that aligns with your gender identity.”

He said that even though his daughter is in New York at the moment, he worries about how she’ll be treated when she comes home to Boise. For example, he’s worried she’ll be forced to undergo a physical exam in public.

“Every single day when I’m out in public, I have to decide: Do I feel like going to jail today, or do I feel like being attacked?” said Nikson Mathews, a trans man and the chair of the Idaho Democratic Queer Caucus, about the new law.

Eve’s mother, Dr. Angie Devitt, said that she would continue to see patients in Idaho even after the family moves to another state.

H.B. 752 is one of three anti-LGBTQ+ laws passed in Idaho this year. H.B. 561, which was also signed on the Trans Day of Visibility, bans local governments from flying Pride flags. The state passed a similar ban last year that had an exemption for official city flags, so the city of Boise made the Pride flag one of its official flags. The GOP-controlled legislature responded this year by passing another flag ban that said flags had to be officially adopted before 2023 to count, just to keep Boise from flying the Pride flag.

And last Friday, Gov. Little signed the “Pediatric Secretive Transitions Parental Rights Act,” which requires doctors and teachers to report gender non-conforming kids to their parents without investigating whether those children will face abuse if outed.

The Idaho Capital-Sun reports that a fourth anti-LGBTQ+ bill could still be passed by the legislature. House Bill 557, which would ban local governments from enacting LGBTQ+ anti-discrimination protections, passed the Idaho House of Representatives but has stalled in the state Senate. Twelve local governments have passed ordinances that would be repealed by this bill if it passes.

April 18, 2026 0

GOP Idaho governor signs severe anti-trans bill to ban kids from “secretive transitions”

Read more at LGBTQ Nation.

Idaho Gov. Brad Little (R) signed a severe anti-trans bill into law last Friday that will require child care providers, health care providers, and educational institutions to out trans kids to their parents if they express any desire to act in a way perceived as discordant with their sex assigned at birth.

The Pediatric Secretive Transitions Parental Rights Act, which will take effect in July, bans folks who care for minors “from facilitating a pediatric sex transition or social transition without informing and obtaining informed consent from a minor child’s parents or guardians.”

The bill aims to close a “loophole” in the state’s anti-trans laws, as cosponsor state Sen. Ben Toews (R) reportedly put it during the state Senate’s debate on the legislation. That loophole, Toews said, is the fact that the state’s gender-affirming care ban does not cover social transitions, which he referred to as “the process by which vulnerable children are led into the pipeline.”

The legislation defines social transition as “the process by which an individual goes from identifying with and living as a gender that corresponds to the individual’s sex to identifying with and living as a gender different from the individual’s sex and may involve social, legal, or physical changes, including adopting a name, pronouns, appearance, or dress that does not correspond to the individual’s sex.”

The covered entities, then, must notify a student’s parents within 72 hours if they request to be referred to using new pronouns or a different name than their legal name; if they ask to use facilities like bathrooms and locker rooms that don’t correspond with their sex assigned at birth; or if they ask to join a sports team that does not align with their birth sex.

Not doing so, the bill says, means “aiding and abetting” a child’s transition before parental consent is obtained. Parents will also be allowed to sue entities for violating the bill, and the attorney general will be authorized to seek civil penalties of up to $100,000.

Democrats argued against the bill for its vague language and the possibility that it would put children with unaccepting families in unsafe situations.

“When we write these bills, we write these statutes, we’re writing them for all families,” argued state Sen. James Ruchti (D), according to the Idaho Statesman. “And so when nurses, when doctors, when educators, tell us we need a little room to be able to handle these situations carefully… and being required to report this within 72 hours takes that out of our hands, and it means that we have to possibly go to a family… and tell them something that that family may not be in a great place to hear.”

State Sen. Melissa Wintrow (D) called the bill “one more that’s just overcontrolling overreach and just goes far beyond what’s necessary.”

“Life isn’t that black and white,” she said.

A lone Republican, state Sen. Jim Guthrie, spoke out against the bill, saying it will “force our teachers to be tattletales” and “put additional stress on teachers that are already stressed… already overworked, and more and more they have to deal with laws like this that are going to force them within 72 hours to make a judgment.”

After the legislature passed the bill, ACLU of Idaho spokesperson Rebecca De León called it an “example of unconstitutional, big government overreach into our private lives.”

“HB 822 threatens to undermine bedrock free speech protections for students, teachers, and health care professionals and is clearly unconstitutional,” she said. “Politicians who stand for small government and personal liberties should not regulate how people dress or express themselves.”

Jane Migliara Brigham, a writer for trans news publication The Needle, slammed the bill for turning doctors, teachers, and the like into “a kind of gender secret police.”

“The language is written such that there is no clear limit on what does not constitute social transition,” Brigham explained. “As a result, whether or not some behavior which is not listed here actually constitutes social transition will be in the eye of the beholder, or more accurately, in the eye of whoever is reporting the behavior to the child’s parents. This ambiguity leaves room for personal judgment, especially where that judgment is informed by anti-trans bigotry.”

Brigham questioned whether a boy wearing pink could count as evidence of a social transition and whether the legislation does not make clear where such an act would fall.

“Most casual observers cannot reliably tell the difference between a child who is trans, gay, gender non-conforming, or one who is simply socially awkward. As a result, what does and does not get reported to parents will, in all likelihood, be determined by bigotry and stereotypes, rather than any clear guidelines.”

At the end of March, Little also signed the nation’s most extreme bathroom ban. The law is the fourth in the U.S. to criminalize trans people’s use of bathrooms and other sex segregated spaces that don’t match the sex they were assigned at birth — similar laws have been enacted in Florida, Kansas, and Utah.

Guthrie was again the lone Republican against the bill. “If [a trans woman goes] in the bathroom of their biological sex, they’re going to upset a lot of people and freak people out,” he told the Associated Press. “If they go in the bathroom that is consistent with their looks — they are knowingly and willingly going into the bathroom — that is breaking the law.”

“They’re human beings,” he said, “just like us, and what are they supposed to do?”

April 15, 2026 0

Doctors can refuse to treat LGBTQ+ patients in several states – these religious exemption laws lead to drops in HIV testing

Measuring the harm

We analyzed data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on the health outcomes of more than 109,000 lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer and heterosexual adults from 2016 to 2018. We focused on eight states, comparing two that enacted conscientious objection laws during that period (Illinois and Mississippi) and six that did not (Louisiana, Minnesota, Ohio, Texas, Wisconsin and Virginia).

To isolate the effect of the laws themselves, we compared changes in health outcomes among LGBQ+ and heterosexual adults living in states with or without religious exemptions to health care, both before and after the laws passed. Making all these comparisons at once allowed us to identify differences in health outcomes due to the laws rather than preexisting differences between states.

We found that conscientious objection laws were associated with significant harms to LGBQ+ adults, including a decline in HIV testing and a worsening of self-rated health.

Our findings highlight how laws permitting clinicians to refuse to provide health care to LGBQ+ patients deepen existing health disparities. Notably, conscientious objection laws are just one type of policy restricting LGBTQ+ people’s access to health care.

The Trump administration has slashed budgets for the federal Ryan White HIV/AIDS program and state-level AIDS drugs assistance programs, reducing the availability of HIV prevention and treatment services. States have also moved to restrict access to gender-affirming care for both minors and adults, despite its additional benefit of helping to reduce new HIV infections. Employers have successfully declined to provide insurance coverage of highly effective HIV prevention medications under religious freedom laws.

Worsening disparities

LGBTQ+ people already face greater health challenges than their heterosexual peers, including higher rates of unmet health care needs and discrimination in medical settings.

HIV preexposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, can lower the risk of contracting HIV from sex by 99%. However, patients are required to receive an HIV test before PrEP can be prescribed. If providers are unwilling or unable to engage with LGBQ+ patients on their sexual health, people who could benefit most from HIV prevention tools, such as PrEP, may never receive them.

Moreover, since the risk of contracting HIV is closely linked to the social determinants of health, such as having safe and stable housing and employment, barriers to HIV testing could further widen health gaps.

Similarly, the worsening in self-rated health among LGBQ+ adults suggests that the cumulative effect of these laws on well-being is real and immediate. A person’s perception of their own health status is one of the strongest predictors of earlier death.

What can be done

Acknowledging the health consequences of conscientious objection laws could help policymakers and the public better understand their impact.

A 2026 national study found that Americans were more motivated to support policies that address LGBTQ+ inequality when these laws were framed as improving health inequality rather than economic inequality or sense of belonging. This finding suggests that people perceive health inequality as unjust and are less likely to blame LGBTQ+ individuals for those circumstances.

Health care systems can build more affirming environments that actively reassure LGBTQ+ patients will receive fair and equitable care. This can encourage more timely access to preventive services, such as vaccinations and cancer screenings.

For LGBTQ+ people, knowing your rights as a patient and seeking out LGBTQ+-affirming providers and community health centers can help mitigate some of the harms of restrictive laws.

April 11, 2026 0

Idaho passed a law just to ban Boise from flying Pride flags. Their response was surprising.

Read more at LGBTQ Nation.

The city of Boise won’t take “no” for an answer. Republicans said no Pride flags, so the mayor responded with Pride “wraps.”

Just days after Idaho Gov. Brad Little (R) signed an updated law that finally banished the Pride standard from flying at City Hall, Boise unveiled vinyl wraps featuring the Progress Pride flag colors on the building’s three flagpoles, reaching nearly all the way up to the flags themselves.

The flags on those poles don’t include a Pride flag.

Last Tuesday, following Little’s signature — not so coincidentally, on the Trans Day of Visibility — Boise Mayor Lauren McLean (D) ordered the city’s Pride flag lowered after more than a decade.

After an earlier law first banned all flags that aren’t official government flags, the City Council made the Pride flag an official city flag. Republicans responded with an update to that law, adding language and fines that the city couldn’t circumvent.

On the day Gov. Little signed the new bill, Mayor McLean stood with council members and about 60 supporters at a special City Council meeting, where they proclaimed March 31 as Transgender Day of Visibility in the state capital.

“Many people in this state and around this country are seeking to divide us. They’re seeking to divide us by targeting the most vulnerable among us,” McLean said as she choked back tears, according to the Idaho Statesman. “I want the people in this room to know that I see you. We see you. You are wanted, important, and unique members of our community.”

That night, McLean lit City Hall in the colors of the transgender flag: pink, white, and baby blue.

Now Boise has added the wraps, and a massive sign hung in the building’s glass facade that declares, “Creating a city for everyone,” alongside a Progress Pride rainbow.

“Well, the law pertained to flags, and we are in full compliance with the law,” Mayor McLean told Boise State Public Radio on Tuesday.

“We have a rich history of an arts and culture scene here,” she added. “So because it’s allowed, we have installed art that demonstrates our values of being a safe and welcoming city for everyone.”

State Rep. Ted Hill (R), who brought the two bills to address Republicans’ displeasure with the Pride flag, told the Statesman he was expecting some kind of response, though he’d guessed it would be a mural.

It was too early to tell whether lawmakers would bring a bill to address the mayor’s workaround, Hill said.

“She’s insulting everyone else,” he complained. “Is that City Hall or some activist Pride Hall?”

April 10, 2026 0

Idaho Republicans pass bill making it a felony for transgender people to use public bathrooms

Idaho House passes resolution- again- asking SCOTUS to overturn marriage equality

Read more at LGBTQ Nation.

The Idaho House of Representatives passed a measure this week asking the Supreme Court to overturn its landmark 2015 decision legalizing same-sex marriage across the U.S. But the legislation lost three Republican votes compared to a similar measure that passed in the state House last year.

As the Idaho Statesman reports, House Joint Memorial 17 passed in a 44–26 vote Tuesday. The measure, introduced by State Rep. Tony Wisniewski (R), is a formal legislative request for the Supreme Court to overturn its 2015 decision in Overgefell v. Hodges. The measure argues that the decision establishing the constitutional right of same-sex couple to legally marry is “at odds with the Constitution of the United States and the principles upon which the United States is established.” In its Obergefell ruling, the measure argues, the Court applied a definition of liberty that would not have been recognized by the country’s founders. The decision, it says, “relies on the dangerous fiction of treating the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution as a font of substantive rights” which “strays from the full meaning of the Constitution.”

House Joint Memorial 17 is identical to House Joint Memorial 1, which the Idaho House passed last year.

This time around, however, 17 Republican lawmakers joined House Democrats to vote against the measure, with three more Republican no votes than in 2025.

According to the Statesman, Republican Reps. Dori Healey and Mike Pohanka, who both voted for House Joint Memorial 1 last year, both voted against the 2026 measure. Grayson Stone, who is serving as a long-term substitute for Rep. Don Hall (R) and recently announced that he is running for Hall’s seat, also voted against the measure. Late last year, Hall replaced former Republican Rep. Lance Clow, who voted for House Joint Memorial 1. Hall resigned due to health issues earlier this year.

Stone reportedly acknowledged that his no vote might amount to “political suicide,” but cited the Bible as the reason for his vote.

“This entire argument is rooted in the Bible,” Stone said, according to the Statesman, noting that the Bible includes instructions on how to shave. “I just don’t understand why we have to apply the Bible to specific aspects of our life, but not all of it. So, I will be voting against this bill.”

Pohanka, meanwhile, noted that his own religious beliefs on same-sex marriage have not changed since he voted for the 2025 measure. However, he told the Statesman that he represents all his constituents and wants to get back to actually legislating.

“I thought we advanced [House Joint Memorial 1] last year,” he said. “This year, to me, it’s just going to cause hurt and pain and I don’t want to do that.”

Healey declined to comment on his vote, according to the Statesman.

House Joint Memorial 17 now advances to the Idaho Senate, which declined to vote on the 2025 measure. Even if the state senate approves House Joint Memorial 17, it would not compel the Supreme Court to act.

While conservative Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito have repeatedly signaled that they are eager to overturn Obergefell, last November the Court declined to hear a case challenging the decision. Fellow conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett has also said that she thinks the court’s same-sex marriage ruling would remain in place because it affects many other rights, including medical, financial, family, and other social rights.

March 12, 2026 0

New Idaho bill would ban cities from banning LGBTQ+ discrimination

Idaho Family Policy Center, which wrote the bill, echoed Skaug’s arguments

The Idaho House Local Government Committee voted to introduce Skaug’s bill Wednesday, teeing it up for a full committee hearing with public testimony. All 14 Republicans on the committee supported introducing it, and the committee’s two Democrats opposed it.

Rep. Steve Berch, a Boise Democrat, called the bill “an overreach of legislative power or state power over the cities and communities.”

Skaug told the committee that the bill would ban more than just local antidiscrimination policies for LGBTQ+ protections, saying it would also prevent housing-related measures that deal with income and familial status. In an interview after the committee hearing, Skaug couldn’t immediately share which localities have those other nondiscrimination measures.

In preparing the bill, Skaug told the Idaho Capital Sun that he worked with the Idaho Family Policy Center and the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative Christian legal group.

In a statement, Idaho Family Policy Center President Blaine Conzatti said local antidiscrimination ordinances “are frequently weaponized against small business owners — especially wedding vendors or those offering creative design services.”

“No small business owner should ever be forced to choose between violating their sincerely held religious beliefs or leaving the marketplace altogether,” he said. “… Government officials have forced bakers, photographers, florists, graphic designers, and wedding venue operators to participate in same-sex wedding ceremonies and pride festivals.”

Planned Parenthood critiques bill as stripping local control

Rep. Marco Erickson, an Idaho Falls Republican, made the motion to introduce the bill in committee.

In 2013, the Idaho Falls City Council first passed an ordinance barring LGBTQ+ discrimination in housing and employment, becoming the seventh Idaho town with such protections at the time, Boise State Public Radio reported. In 2020, the Idaho Falls City Council expanded the discrimination protections to public accommodations, the Post Register reported.

In a statement, Planned Parenthood Alliance Advocates’ Idaho State Director Mistie DelliCarpini-Tolman critiqued the bill as stripping local control.

“In places across Idaho, locally elected officials are ready and willing to stop discrimination, and this bill blocks them from doing exactly that, what voters elected them to do,” Tolman said. “That isn’t small government. It’s a uniform denial of basic protections that tells LGBTQ+ Idahoans and other marginalized residents that their safety and dignity don’t matter.”

January 30, 2026 0

GOP official just banned “Everyone is Welcome Here” signs in schools because they’re too Democratic

Read more at LGBTQ Nation.

The attorney general of Idaho issued an opinion telling schools not to allow teachers to post signs that say “Everyone is Welcome Here,” claiming that the message that public education is for everyone regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, or other categories is Democratic in nature and therefore illegally partisan.

“These signs are part of an ideological/social movement which started in Twin Cities, Minnesota, following the 2016 election,” Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador (R) said in guidance issued to a school. “Since that time, the signs have been used by the Democratic party as a political statement.”

.Labrador also noted that the state Democratic Party is selling signs that say “Everyone is Welcome Here,” but state Democrats say that they only started selling those signs at cost in order to draw attention to conservatives’ early attempts to ban them.

The conflict centers on Idaho’s H.B. 41, which took effect last week and bans school employees from displaying flags or banners that show “opinions, emotions, beliefs or thoughts about politics, economics, society, faith or religion.”

Earlier this year, the state’s West Ada School District banned Sarah Inama, a teacher at Lewis and Clark Middle School, from displaying a sign that says, “Everyone is Welcome Here.” It showed a drawing of people’s hands with different skin tones, each with a heart on it.

The district also ordered her to take down another sign that read, “In this room everyone is welcome, important, accepted, respected, encouraged, valued, equal” on top of a background of rainbow colors. The rainbow colors included seven stripes, which differs from the six-striped rainbow Pride flag.

The controversy over the signs garnered national headlines in March, and the state attorney general’s office looked into how the law would apply in such cases, issuing an opinion last week.

The attorney general determined that these specific signs would violate H.B. 41 and claimed that the statements in the signs are part of a political movement and not, as defenders of the signs argued, generally agreed-upon beliefs about the nature of public education.

Labrador’s guidance hyperlinked a 2017 news story about a group of women who protested racist graffiti that appeared at a local high school the day after the president was elected to his first term, according to the Idaho Capital-Sun, which posted the attorney general’s opinion. The women carried signs that read, “All are Welcome Here.”

The guidance then claimed that Inama started posting the “Everyone is Welcome Here” sign in 2017, “during the height of the above-referenced social movement.”

In March, Inama disagreed that the message is political or partisan.

“I don’t agree. I don’t agree that this is a personal opinion,” she told KTVB at the time. “I feel like this is the basis of public education.”

Inama resigned in May.

July 8, 2025 0

Boise City Council approves resolution adopting pride flag as official flag amid state law tensions

*This is reported by KTVB.

On Tuesday, Boise City Council members approved a resolution designating three flags, including the Pride flag, as official flags of the City of Trees.

The vote comes amid ongoing tensions between Boise Mayor Lauren McLean and the Idaho Attorney General over a new state law, House Bill 96, which regulates which flags local governments can display.

“A city should be able to put up flags at various times for whatever reason the community might want,” community member Patti Raino said, “and this is a community that supports, certainly pride. Has always supported pride.”

Hundreds of people showed up to rally in support of the city before the meeting started. About a dozen of those were protestors against the resolution — including Robert Coggins.

“I’m just a native Idahoan,” he said. “I feel like I do not have a voice, and this mayor does not let me have a voice. I think [the flag is] exclusionary. It doesn’t represent me.”

Council President Colin Nash, who sponsored the resolution, said it would help “memorialize” flags the city flies and ensure compliance with state law.

“It’s important for us, not only to communicate to any law enforcement that might be interested, but also to the public that we’re doing this out of a sense of duty, rather than defiance of the state legislature,” Nash said before the vote.

Nash added the flags represent the city’s values and responsibilities.

“This is our lawful expression of our dedication to ensuring all members of our community feel seen, respected, and welcome,” he said. “I think there is an expectation among the opponents of it, that the government should remain neutral in issues like this. I’m not neutral on defending marginalized neighbors.”

The resolution includes not only the Pride flag but also designates the blue City of Boise flag and the white organ donor flag honoring National Donate Life Month as official city flags.

City officials say the resolution acknowledges and formally ratifies that flags flown at Boise City Hall comply with Idaho state law.

The council meeting did not include public testimony on the resolution. During the council discussion, McLean reminded the public in attendance they could not speak after several members of the audience made comments towards the council.

The city announced last week, attorneys from Holland & Hart have volunteered to represent Boise pro bono if any legal action is taken against the city regarding this matter. The volunteer legal team includes Erik Stidham, Jennifer Jensen, Alex Grande and Anne Haws.

May 7, 2025 0

Idaho bill bans government from flying LGBTQ+ rainbow flags. Here’s how it impacts Boise

*This is being reported by the Idaho Statesman.

LGBTQ+ Pride flags in Boise’s North End remain in limbo after Idaho lawmakers passed a bill that bans the flags in some public spaces.

House lawmakers Friday approved amendments to House Bill 96, which allows government entities to display only certain flags, such as the official Idaho, U.S. and state flags. The bill still needs Gov. Brad Little’s signature to become law.

“The ultimate goal is for us to fly flags that unite and don’t divide,” said Sen. Ben Toews, R-Coeur d’Alene, during a floor debate.

Earlier this year, photographs given to legislators on the House floor included the Pride flags along Harrison Boulevard, where flags are flown during Pride Month in June, and at Boise City Hall. Boise spokesperson Maria Weeg said the bill would likely impact the city’s Pride flags, but in a later message told the Idaho Statesman that the city hasn’t officially engaged on the bill and “we don’t usually comment on bills that have not been signed into law.”

As written, the bill would ban the Harrison Pride flags, because the Ada County Highway District controls the medians, ACHD spokesperson Rachel Bjornestad previously told the Statesman. Those flags have been stolen or vandalized four years in a row. Proponents said the legislation is important to preserve neutrality, and even conservative flags would be banned. But critics said the bills target marginalized communities because it’s a direct response to the Pride flags flown in Boise.

“Now, when we want to celebrate and unite under this rainbow flag and support our community, that is going to be taken from us by the state,” said Senate Minority Leader Melissa Wintrow, D-Boise. “We welcome everyone in my district.”

The bill’s passage comes days after Little signed House Bill 41, which bans schools from displaying flags and banners that “promote political, religious or ideological viewpoints.” A week before, a Meridian teacher’s posters drew local and national headlines, according to previous Statesman reporting. West Ada School District officials had told Sarah Inama, a world civilization teacher, to take down two signs, including one with “Everyone is welcome here,” above hands of different skin tones.

Community members have responded by marking welcoming messages outside West Ada schools, according to previous Statesman reporting, as well as making and wearing shirts with the sign’s message. Utah this week became the first state to prohibit Pride flags in both schools and all government buildings.

March 29, 2025 0