A Tale of Two Kansases
Updated: Aug 16
I may have been born in Ohio, but Kansas is my chosen home. There’s so much to be proud of our home state for—from our early days joining the Union as a free state to desegregating schools through Brown v. Board of Education to being the first state to reaffirm reproductive rights as a constitutional right post Roe and more.
Alas, there are two Kansases, as M. Gessen points out in their latest article for The New York Times entitled, “What’s Happening in Kansas Should Alarm Us All” (if you don't have a NYT subscription, you can still create a free account to read the article). Gessen reports on what SB244 (AKA the “bathroom bill”) has done to people across our state, and I was one of the Kansans they talked to.
As you may know, earlier this year my colleagues in the Kansas Legislature passed one of the most sweeping anti-trans laws in the country—a law so hastily written that hundreds of transgender Kansans received official letters demanding they surrender their driver's licenses, with no grace period and no clear answers about what happens to the people the letters never reach.
For those of you who may be new here, I'm a Wichita Democrat, an Air Force veteran, and I represent House District 86 in the Kansas House. I was appointed to fill a vacant seat at the start of this legislative session, and I'm the only openly trans member of the Legislature, and only the second trans legislator in Kansas history. I'm also one of the people living under the very law I fought against on the House floor.
Here's what that looks like in practice: the Capitol—a building hundreds visit every day to admire the frescoes and murals—has exactly one bathroom I am legally allowed to use. It's a single-occupancy room that doubles as a lactation space; I've delayed floor votes waiting my turn for it.
In April, I married my wife, Monica, on the front porch of our Wichita home. Kansas is my home and I have no plans to leave.
Don’t get me wrong— all of this can feel disheartening, discouraging, and infuriating. Some days, I daydream of disappearing from public life. But that’s not who I am.
I will continue to show up to a statehouse where I'm outnumbered because I believe a different Kansas is possible. One built on the same instincts that made us a free state, and defended reproductive rights not once but twice in the past five years alone. A Kansas where healthcare is treated as a right. Where public schools are fully funded instead of fought over. Where a living wage is the law of the land. Where civil rights aren't reopened for debate every legislative session.
This is the Kansas that I am fighting for every day.
