Ohio Governor Signs Law Prohibiting Opposite-Sex Access to Bathrooms in Schools

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine speaks in Columbus, Ohio, on May 23, 2024. Patrick Orsagos/AP Photo

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signed a bill on Nov. 27 prohibiting students from kindergarten through college from using bathrooms that do not align with their sex.

Rep. Adam Bird (R-Ohio), who co-sponsored the bill titled “Protect All Students Act” with Rep. Beth Lear (R-Ohio), praised DeWine’s decision to sign the bill, stating that he’s grateful students will now not have to be concerned about students of the opposite sex coming into restrooms, locker rooms, and changing rooms in Ohio.

Bird said the law also applies to any place where school-sponsored activities are being held. The law will go into effect in February 2025.

“Institutions of higher education, including state universities, community and technical colleges, and both private nonprofit and for-profit career colleges, must use clear signage for these designations to ensure clarity for students and staff,” Bird said.

He said Ohio is the 14th state that passed privacy legislation for student bathrooms.

“This legislation has always been about protecting students, and I think that’s something we should all be able to agree on,” Bird said in an earlier statement. “Many Ohioans don’t want their local schools to allow opposite-sex access to restrooms or locker rooms. The Protect All Students Act will provide clarity and a unified approach for school leaders statewide.”

DeWine didn’t comment on the signing of the bill.

In January, the Republican-led state Senate overrode DeWine’s veto of a bill that banned gender-altering surgeries and hormone therapies for children under 18. It also prohibited students from playing on sports teams opposite of their sex.

DeWine said he vetoed the legislation to prevent government overreach into parents’ medical decisions for their children.

“Ultimately, these tough, tough decisions should not be made by the government,“ DeWine said last year. ”They should be made by the people who love these kids the most, and that’s the parents. The parents who have raised that child, the parents who have seen that child go through agony, the parents who worry about that child every single day of their life.”

So far, 26 states passed laws prohibiting transgender surgery for minors. About 11 states have passed bathroom laws.

During the 2024 presidential election campaign, President-elect Donald Trump targeted Vice President Kamala Harris’s support for government-funded transgender surgeries for illegal immigrants and prisoners with two ads.

A quote from one ad stated, “Kamala is for they/them; President Trump is for you.”

Some Democratic strategists have said that it might have been a more important issue than they previously thought going into the election.

“Obviously, it was a very effective ad in the end,” Quintin Fulks, one of Harris’s campaign managers, said in an interview on the progressive podcast “Pod Save America.”

Fulks said the ad accomplished two goals: it portrayed Harris as being out of touch with the American people, and it suggested that citizens would be the ones fitting the bill for transgender surgeries.