Kansas Republicans overrode Democrat Gov. Laura Kelly’s veto of a bill mandating people use restrooms according to their biology rather than their self-proclaimed “gender identity.” 

The Kansas Senate voted to override the veto on Tuesday 31-9, and the Kansas House voted 87-37 on Wednesday, the Topeka Capital-Journal reported. 

The override means the bathroom bill, Senate Bill 244, is the second new law of the 2026 session and the first to take effect, according to the report. Senate President Ty Masterson (R) said the override “restored sanity” and said Kelly’s veto “would have forced our mothers, sisters, wives, and daughters to share their bathrooms with biological men in government buildings.” 

“Kansas Democrats are for They/Them,” Masterson said in a statement. “I will continue to fight for you, and protect women and girls across our state.”

Democrat state Rep. Abi Boatman, a man who pretends to be a woman, claimed the law “obviously discriminates against transgender people in ways that make our lives exponentially more difficult and dangerous.”

The bill would specifically require government buildings, which include public schools and universities, to separate bathrooms and locker rooms by biological sex.

Those who violate the law could be fined or sued for $1,000 and could be criminally charged for repeatedly using facilities that do not match their biological reality.

The bill includes some exceptions, including allowing parents/caregivers to take children under nine years old to opposite-sex bathrooms and allowing coaches into opposite-sex locker rooms as long as everyone is clothed.

Another part of the bill would bar Kansas residents from changing the sex marker on their state-issued driver’s licenses and birth certificates.

Kelly claimed in her veto message that the bill is “poorly drafted” and “will have numerous and significant consequences far beyond the intent to limit the right of trans people to use the appropriate bathroom.”

“Under this bill: If your grandfather is in a nursing home in a shared room, as a granddaughter, you would not be able to visit him. If your wife is in a shared hospital room, as a husband, you would not be able to visit her,” she claimed. “If your sister is living in a dorm at K-State, as a brother, you would not be able to visit her in her room.”  

“If you feel you have to accompany your nine-year-old daughter to the restroom at a sporting event, as a father, you would have to either enter the women’s restroom with her or let her use the restroom alone,” she added. 

State Sen. Kellie Warren (R) said all of the governor’s examples in her veto. message are “not the subject of the bill.” Warren emphasized the subject of the bill is “restrooms, locker rooms, changing rooms, shower rooms or other rooms that are specifically designed or designated by the government for people to change and be in a state of undress.”

State Rep. Susan Humphries (R) said Kelly’s veto message was “full of red herrings” and failed to “address the merits” of the legislation.

Before the governor’s veto, the bathroom bill passed with more than two-thirds support of the GOP-dominated state House and Senate.

In 2025, the state legislature was able to successfully override a veto from Kelly to pass a law banning sex change drugs for minors. The law is being challenged in state court.

Katherine Hamilton is a political reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on X @thekat_hamilton.