Maryland's Flawed Gender Identity Bill is Dead, New Bill in the Works.

Metro Weekly Reports that Maryland's gender identity protection bill died in the senate on Monday. Legislation would have made it illegal in The Free State to discriminate in housing and employment on the basis gender identity or expression, but NOT in public accommodations (rest rooms).

If this law had passed, for example, it would have been illegal for a restaurant to fire you for transitioning from male to female, but they could legally forbid you to use the ladies room, forcing you to quit.

The removal of public accommodations protections was the typical Democratic strategy of caving in to Republicans in order to get the bill passed, which ended up not working any way. In its final form, this was a bad bill and it deserved to die.

Via Metro Weekly:

Sen. Richard Madaleno (D-Montgomery), the only out LGBT member of the Maryland Senate, provided a statement to Metro Weekly regarding today's move by the Senate killing the Gender Identity Anti-Discrimination Act, House Bill 235.

Most notably, Madaleno said that, prior to the start of the 2012 session, he "will pre-file a new version of the Gender Identity Antidiscrimination Act that includes provisions for housing and employment, as well as public accommodations" with aim of "a full debate and vote in the Senate before the last day of the session."

Read the full story here.

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• Maryland Senate Kills Gender Identity Bill (towleroad.com)
• Maryland Senate Kills Transgender Protection Bill (lezgetreal.com)