How transgender Kansans’ lives were upended overnight by invalidated licenses
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Kansas law forces about 1,800 trans residents to surrender updated IDs overnight.
- Affected Kansans report confusion, denied services and administrative chaos.
- ACLU and activists filed legal challenge to block enforcement of the law.
Hello, Star readers.
Today, we’re looking into how an anti-trans law has suddenly upended the lives of roughly 1,800 Kansans. “They’re punishing us so much because we have the audacity to just exist,” trans activist Isaac Johnson told my colleague Eleanor Nash.
Next, we’ll get into:
• FBI probe upends KC: Here’s what we know — and what we still don’t know — about a sweeping federal investigation that has roiled local politics.
• Challenging Roger Marshall? Meet the popular Johnson County megachurch pastor who is exploring an independent Senate campaign to unseat Kansas Sen. Roger Marshall.
This week in politics
The chaotic rollout of a new Kansas law policing transgender identity has sown confusion and anxiety among trans residents who are being required to surrender their driver’s licenses and told where they can and can’t use the restroom on government property.
Last Wednesday, Kansans who previously updated the sex designation on their driver’s licenses and birth certificates began receiving letters from the Kansas Department of Revenue informing them that their otherwise valid identity documents would be considered invalid as of Thursday.
The Star spoke to five Kansas LGBTQ activists, including three trans Kansans affected by the ID change. They told stories of anger, exhaustion and solidarity amidst attacks from their own state government.
“I feel so helpless in all of this and I hate that it’s happening. … It’s just terrible,” said Riley Long, a Shawnee trans activist.
Avery Rowland, a trans woman who lives in Girard, tried to get a new driver’s license at the Crawford County Courthouse on Thursday morning, but the clerk was confused.
“She said, ‘Well, you’re a woman. It says woman on your passport. I don’t know what to do,’” Rowland told my colleague Eleanor.
Read the latest on a legal challenge brought by the ACLU on behalf of two trans Kansans who are trying to block enforcement of the new state law.
More from this past week
• KCPD Chief Stacey Graves allegedly made sexually explicit comments and gestures toward a subordinate officer, and later retaliated against him, according to a newly filed lawsuit.
• Protests broke out at the University of Kansas last Friday after ICE agents reportedly detained two people on campus. Here’s what students and KU officials had to say.
• Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly reached an agreement with the Trump administration to turn over the personal data of SNAP recipients after refusing to do so. Here’s why she reversed course.
Looking for more?
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That’s all for now! See you next week.