On Trans Visibility Day in March, Gov. Brad Little signed into law a bill that criminalizes trans people for using public restrooms not aligned with their birth sex. For some, that means living in Idaho is simply not tenable anymore.
For Lexci Menhart, a 29-year-old barista and music administrator at Cathedral of the Rockies in downtown Boise, the state’s latest anti-trans legislation is a turning point: she has decided to move out of Idaho.
“The idea of leaving has just been heart wrenching. It's been so difficult,” she said.
She will be leaving the state she's called home for close to 20 years in July, when her lease ends and just as the new law goes into effect.
“I am making this decision now so that it doesn't feel like I'm fleeing in the future. I don't want to live somewhere where laws are being created to criminalize who I am,” Menhart added, saying she anticipates things will continue to get worse for trans people in Idaho.
Under HB 752, a first time offense can lead to a misdemeanor. A second one to felony charges and up to five years in prison.
“It makes me have to choose between risking a criminal penalty to use the restroom or risking my own personal safety. As soon as I go into a men's room, I'm outing myself, and putting myself in an extremely dangerous situation,” Menhart said.
While she’s found support and community in Boise, she said being trans in Idaho can be scary.
“To be harassed and to be ridiculed for simply having to go to the bathroom and existing as a trans person, that's just not a reality that I want to live in,” Menhart said.
Menhart already has to be cautious in public: she’s experienced people following her into stores and strangers asking about her genitalia.
“There are some people that feel like they have the right to antagonize you just for who you are,” she said. “So I'm looking forward to maybe not dealing with so much of that anxiety in Washington.”
Menhart wishes people understood she lives a very normal life: she goes to church, she goes to work, she’s a student with friends, family and aspirations.
“It's hard for me to understand and for me to wrap my head around why it is so divisive and why it is so controversial that I live such a normal life,” Menhart said.
“My identity as a woman is the only identity that I've ever known. And, I can only explain that with the lens that I was created this way by God, just as we were all created to be who we are,” she added.
A recent UCLA school of law analysis found fewer than 1% of U.S. adults are transgender but are four times more likely to be victims of a violent crime than cisgender people.
