In a move widely denounced by civil rights groups, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine signed S.B. 104 on Nov.  27, 2024. Going into effect on Feb. 25, the bill requires transgender students, faculty and staff to use bathrooms that align with their assigned sex at birth and bans gender-neutral multi-stall bathrooms. In a statement, Jocelyn Rosnick, the policy director for the ACLU of Ohio, described the bill as “a cruel invasion of students’ rights to privacy …  If allowed to go into effect, SB 104 will create unsafe environments for trans and gender non-conforming individuals of all ages.”

I can attest to the feeling of fear and discouragement that many LGBTQIA+ people are feeling right now. In the wake of the passage of this bill, the outcome of the 2024 election—in which the validity of trans identities was a wedge issue—the forthcoming Supreme Court decision in United States v. Skrmetti, which challenges the legality of bans on gender-affirming care for minors, the recent rejection of the Biden administration’s extension of Title IX protections for sexual orientation and gender identity in the District Court of the Eastern District of Kentucky and more broadly, the normalization of President-elect Donald Trump’s politics, it’s easy to feel suffocated by the weight of the backlash to how much queer and trans people have gained in the last decade. The university has to do more to combat that feeling, and doing so will help not only queer and trans people but all members of our community.

Trump’s first presidency was often treated as an aberration. His lies were fact-checked on X and Facebook and the specific politics of resentment he personified were not embraced—or even tolerated—by most companies and institutions with a great deal of public visibility. This is especially true when it comes to conservative stances on LGBTQIA+ rights. Trump’s first administration reversed a lot of the gains made during former President Barack Obama’s incumbency, revoking protections from discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, banning trans people from the military and more. At the same time, though, LGBTQIA+ Americans enjoyed a period of much greater visibility and were not the target of public ire as they have been more recently. When the North Carolina legislature passed a statewide bathroom bill in March 2016, the public and institutional outcry—including boycotts by the NCAA, Deutsche Bank, Adidas, PayPal and Lionsgate—was so great that it was repealed by March 2017.

One could not expect such an outcry today. Since 2020, Republican-controlled state legislatures have been passing increasingly severe anti-trans laws, including bathroom bills, restrictions and bans on gender-affirming care, “don’t say gay/trans” bills and more. As of writing, 15 states have laws restricting bathroom usage by transgender individuals, 24 states ban all gender-affirming care for minors and 21 states have some form of “don’t say gay/trans” bill on the books. All of those figures include Ohio, which has a ban on all gender-affirming care for minors, bans trans women and girls from playing in K-12 and college-level sports, requires educators to out LGBTQIA+ students to their parents and will soon have an active bathroom bill.

Since Trump’s reelection, the rising tide of LGBTQIA+ rights also appears to be reversing in the private sector. Meta recently axed its DEI programs, killed Facebook’s and Instagram’s fact-checking programs—which were criticized for alleged bias by the right—and revised their speech policies to be more lenient towards hate speech. Notably, the new speech guidelines contain a carveout that specifically allows users to share “allegations of mental illness or abnormality when based on gender or sexual orientation, given political and religious discourse about transgenderism and homosexuality.” 

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in an Instagram post that this would make the guidelines more in line with the “mainstream discourse” on the issue of gender. Additionally, X, owned by Elon Musk, who will co-head Trump’s so-called “Department of Government Efficiency,” changed its policies in 2023 to allow hate speech against trans people and classified “cisgender” as a slur.  Elite institutions and business leaders have been kowtowing to Trump since his reelection, which New York Times columnist Ezra Klein argues is a signal that they are willing to abide by the “new rules” of Trump’s politics. Trump posted “EVERYBODY WANTS TO BE MY FRIEND!!!” on his social media platform Truth Social after a recent dinner with Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos. One of the more concerning outcomes we might anticipate during the upcoming administration is the embrace of Trumpism in the C-suite of major corporations, which could pose dangerous downstream effects on the cultural legitimacy of LGBTQIA+ individuals.

One of the missions of Case Western Reserve University is to foster inclusiveness and diversity, so it needs to be part of the resistance to this realignment. Amid a rising tide of hate, the university must do more to foster an environment of inclusivity and transparency regarding LGBTQIA+ rights. We are located in Ohio, a state that is likely to become an even more fraught environment for LGBTQIA+ people in the coming years. A failure by the administration to do so would place the vibrant queer culture we have on campus at risk. This would hurt not only the queer community but every member of the larger university community. More broadly, CWRU must take a stronger stance against Trumpism, especially where it threatens fundamental ethical principles that CWRU purports to adhere to. 

So far, I am not optimistic about the strength of the administration’s response. At the Nov. 19, 2024 USG General Assembly and in a later email on Dec. 3, 2024, CWRU President Eric Kaler indicated that in response to S.B. 104, the university would, “of course, abide by the law.” This was followed by the guarantee that the university is  “collaborating with campus partners—from our facilities teams to our LGBT Center and more—to ensure all members of our community, especially those who are transgender, feel safe, comfortable and supported.” While it’s nice for President Kaler to express that sentiment, his words must be followed up with answers to pressing questions and substantive action to protect and strengthen LGBTQIA+ life at CWRU. 

Here are a few open questions I have: what, if any, university policies will change? Will there be any efforts to expand single-stall gender-neutral bathrooms? What will happen to first-year gender-inclusive housing? According to a comment from the University, “University Housing and Residential Life staff have identified measures that both comply with the law… and [allow] students to continue to live in Gender Inclusive Housing.”

While the LGBT Center is a fantastic resource and I encourage students to take advantage of its programs and student groups, President Kaler cannot simply point to its existence as a panacea for the queer community on campus. When asked for comment on the university’s response to the bill, LGBT Center Director Avery Ware replied the center is “working with our facilities colleagues to update the university’s single-stall bathroom map “for accuracy and accessibility.” Of course, this is a necessary step. But it cannot be the only one we take.

First, we need more transparency. President Kaler’s email was imprecise and contained very little concrete information. These are uncertain times, and some certainty—even some clarity—would be welcome. Next, we need a smarter response. Thus far, the university will be complying with both the letter and spirit of the law—which intends to other trans people—by simply changing some signs and saying the university is going to follow the law. Making a small number of single-stall gender-neutral bathrooms the only option for trans people represents segregation of cisgender and transgender people; moreover, there just aren’t enough of them for that to work well. I’m nonbinary and often find myself walking all over campus to use the bathroom. More gender-neutral bathrooms are necessary to make it easier for everyone, not just trans and nonbinary people, to use the bathroom. We might consider alternative solutions, like converting bathrooms to all-gender with fully private stalls, which might allow each stall to be categorized as its own single-toilet restroom. I also advocate for an assurance that the university will not attempt to enforce this law. 

More broadly, though, the administration’s new Freedom of Expression Policy, general disposition towards campus activism and harsh punitive actions in the past year have created an environment where public political statements and dissent are increasingly difficult and dangerous. Rolling back that policy would go a long way in creating a more vibrant campus culture that fosters diversity, human rights and open communication.

We must demand more from our leadership. Let me be clear: trans rights are human rights. This does not just mean that trans people are human, ergo they have rights. It means that the right to transition is the same as the rights to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” enshrined in our Declaration of Independence. It is the right to be oneself; it is the right to exist. A failure to meet the needs of our students in an area as basic as the right to self-definition and self-actualization would be a profound failure of leadership on behalf of Kaler’s administration.