I am the first out transgender person to be elected to office in Tennessee, serving on the Metro Nashville Council representing 660,000 people.
I am serving in a state where the Republican supermajority has passed life-threatening, dehumanizing laws against people like me, including a ban on gender-affirming care for individuals under the age of 18.
There will soon be few, if any, transgender care physicians practicing in Tennessee. My long-term specialist is planning their departure.
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Metro Nashville Council At-Large member Olivia Hill, Tennessee's first openly transgender politician to be elected sits in her seat for the first time in the Metro Nashville City Council Chamber. Nashville, TN on September 17, 2023.
Ray Di Pietro/Shutterstock
In 2023, Tennessee lawmakers filed 24 bills aimed at transgender people. (The Volunteer State isn’t unique. According to Trans Legislation Tracker, 583 hateful bills were filed in 49 states. That’s up from 174 in 2022 as the political environment has intensified against my community.)
Of all the harmful Tennessee bills, SB 1 concerns me most. It isn’t just marginalizing; it endangers lives. Passed in March, the law not only bans gender-affirming therapies like puberty blockers and hormone replacement for minors but also requires them to de-transition.
Transgender rights activist Eli Givens raises a sign in opposition of HB1 in the TN House Health subcommittee. January 31, 2023. The law will make transition surgery and treatment for minors illegal in Tennessee.
Ray Di Pietro/ShutterstockExperts know that it is healthier for transgender kids to have puberty blockers. Indeed, the Mayo Clinic states that puberty blockers not only decrease the need for surgeries in adulthood, but they lower suicidal thoughts and self-harm and improve mental and social well-being. They also give individuals time to think, explore, and plan their lives. These are rights that every other kid is afforded in life.
As a person who knew at a tender age that I was not the gender that had been assigned to me, I struggled to fit in. I did all the things a psychiatrist told me I needed to do in order to be an alpha boy of the time: sports, hunting, fishing, camping, and even dipping tobacco.
With every fiber of my body, I pretended to be something I was not, and it almost killed me.
According to the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law, the suicide attempt rate among transgender people is over 40 percent. I became part of that statistic when I held a gun to my head when I was a teenager and in another attempt in my late 30s. If I had been afforded proper care early on in life, then I would have been much healthier.
Families with transgender children—and some transgender adults—have left Tennessee because they cannot access proper healthcare. Fortunately for me, I have the resources to travel for care. For far too many individuals, travel is not an option.
Another bill signed into law in May, SB 1440, criminalizes transgender people who simply want to live their lives. The measure bars transgender individuals from changing their gender on driver’s licenses and birth certificates. If I am pulled over at a traffic stop and asked to produce my license, I could be arrested and jailed with men.
I recently wrote to my governor, lieutenant governor and House speaker with a request to meet and discuss the ramifications of the demonizing environment that lawmakers have created. Human Rights Watch and other national organizations who track violence against transgender people report that violence has risen significantly in states where lawmakers have been intent on passing harmful laws.
Drag Performer Vidalia Anne Gentry holds a Pride flag at a Have a Heart Tennessee Rally on February 14, 2023 in Legislative Plaza at the Tennessee State Capitol in Nashville in opposition to the SB3/HB9 bill that would prohibit drag performances in public.
Ray Di Pietro/Shutterstock
These leaders claim to be pro-life. Laws targeting transgender people are anything but. Without access to proper care, transgender Tennesseans’ lives are harmed. Some lives will be lost.
Transgender people are valid, valuable human beings who deserve equal treatment. As a combat veteran, I put my life on the line for every single person living in America, not just certain people. As an elected official, I took an oath to serve every single person living in Metropolitan Nashville, not just some people. And as a Christian, I know God made us all in his likeness. Every person that God has made is perfect and precious.
God doesn’t make junk. I just hope I can persuade my state's leaders to see that.
