Feb. 26 (UPI) — A new Kansas law requiring transgender residents’ state-issued identification to reflect their “sex at birth” went into effect Thursday, immediately invalidating hundreds of driver’s licenses and birth certificates.
KCUR-TV in Kansas City, Kan., reported that people began receiving notices this week from the Kansas Department of Revenue instructing them to request new identification cards and birth certificates if they had ever updated the gender marker on the documents.
The requirement is a result of legislation known as SD 244 going into effect Thursday. It bans transgender people from using bathrooms that match their gender identity. It also gives citizens the ability to sue transgender people for $1,000 if they encounter them breaking that law.
Other states ban transgender people from changing the gender marker on their IDs, but Kansas’ new law also nullifies any changes previously made legally.
State Rep. Abi Boatman, a transgender woman, shared a copy of the KDOR letter dated Monday on Facebook on Wednesday. It said those receiving the letter will have their identification records nullified.
“Additionally, please note that the Legislature did not include a grace period for updating credentials,” the letter reads. “This means that once the law is officially enacted, your current credential will be invalid immediately, and you may be subject to additional penalties if you are operating a vehicle without a valid credential.”
In a separate Facebook post Monday, Boatman said each person who must change their license will have to pay a $26 fee for a standard license.
“Be sure to thank your Republican representatives for not only cancelling the driver’s licenses of 1,700 transgender Kansans but also making them pay for a new one,” she wrote.
“It’s a wild time when Kansas can erase human beings while simultaneously making $45,000 off of them.”
Kansas’ Republican-majority Legislature used a process known as “gut and go” to pass SB 244 earlier this month, The Guardian reported. It allowed lawmakers to replace the text of one bill with entirely new language and to bypass committee review and expedite the voting process.
Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly vetoed the bill, calling it “poorly drafted legislation,” but the Legislature overrode her veto with a supermajority vote.
Attorney General Kris Kobach, who supported SB 244, said in a Facebook post about the signing of the legislation that he was “thankful for Kansas lawmakers who stand firm on this.”
“No more confusion on official IDs — biology matters, and truth wins.”
After the passage, Anthony Alvarez, who works for Loud Light Civic Action and is a transgender man, said the new law deputizes citizens and gives them financial incentive to turn against transgender Kansans.
“Every aspect of my public life will be subject to policing — from when I show my ID to vote or go to the bank to when I want to visit my friends in their dorm room or when I was my hands before I eat,” he said in a statement shared by the American Civil Liberties Union in Kansas.
The ACLU said it plans to challenge the law in court.