Voters in three states will face upcoming ballot measures regarding protecting girls’ sports from transgender-identifying athletes and preventing minors from receiving sex changes, according to multiple reports.
Voters in states such as Colorado, Missouri, and Maine will be able to vote on the upcoming ballot initiatives in the midterm elections.
In Colorado, the organization Protect Kids Colorado got enough signatures for three ballot initiatives — Initiative 108, Initiative 109, and Initiative 110 — to qualify for the ballot, according to the Colorado Sun.
Under Initiative 108, child sex trafficking would be “punishable by life in prison without the possibility of parole,” while under Initiative 109, transgender-identifying children would not be allowed to participate in sports that do not “align with their biological sex,” according to the outlet.
Under Initiative 110, “surgery on a child for the purpose of altering their biological sex characteristics” would not be allowed. The use of “state or federal funds, Medicaid reimbursement or insurance coverage” to pay for a minor’s sex change would also not be allowed.
While Rocky Mountain Equality, an LGBTQ non-profit, expressed that “the questions are ‘an attack on Colorado families,’” Erin Lee, who serves as the director for Protect Kids Colorado, said her group was “empowering everyday Coloradans to take action” and “protect children.”
“We’re empowering everyday Coloradans to take actions, protect children, and restore common-sense policies through the citizen-led lawmaking process,” Lee explained.
An SLU/YouGov poll, conducted between February 9-22, and which surveyed 900 voters in Missouri, found that while “some provisions” of an amendment that would ban abortions “are very unpopular,” roughly 67 percent of respondents “oppose gender transition medications for minors,” according to the Missouri Independent:
Some provisions of the amendment, which would ban most abortions except in cases of rape, incest or to save a mother’s life, are very unpopular, the poll shows. Almost 60% of Missourians support allowing an abortion before the eighth week of pregnancy and 47% support it up to the 12th week.
But the section of the amendment banning transgender minors from receiving puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones or gender transition surgeries is overwhelmingly popular. The poll found that 67% of those surveyed oppose gender transition medications for minors and 73% opposed gender transition surgeries.
In Maine, the state’s Secretary of State Shenna Bellows confirmed that an initiative “focused on transgender sports participation and bathroom access at school” had received enough signatures to appear on the ballot, according to Spectrum News.
The initiative will go “before state lawmakers, who are likely to send it directly to voters,” according to the outlet.
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