Rep. Susan DuBose, R-Hoover, presents SB 79, a bill putting definitions of sex into state law, on the floor of the Alabama House of Representatives on Feb. 12, 2025 at the Alabama Statehouse in Montgomery, Alabama. (Brian Lyman/Alabama Reflector)
A bill defining sex-based terms passed the Alabama House 77-12 Wednesday morning and is headed to Gov. Kay Ivey’s desk.
SB 79, sponsored by Sen. April Weaver, R-Alabaster, commonly known as the What is a Woman Act, would define “sex” as the “state of being male or female as observed or clinically verified at birth” and provide further definitions for male, female, man, woman, boy, girl, mother and father.
“We do need to pass this law for clarity, certainty and uniformity in the courts and in the laws of Alabama,” said Rep. Susan DuBose, R-Hoover, who handled the bill in the chamber.
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A message seeking comment was left with Ivey’s office on Wednesday morning. The governor said in her State of the State address last week that she planned to sign it.
The bill would define genders as “male” and “female” based on human reproductive system function. Female would be defined as a person “who has, had, will have, or would have, but for a developmental anomaly, genetic anomaly, or accident, the reproductive system that at some point produces ova.”
Male would be defined as someone “who has, had, will have, or would have, but for a developmental anomaly, genetic anomaly, or accident, the reproductive system that at some point produces sperm.”
The Republican majority placed on the bill on what is known as a 10-minute calendar, limiting debate over the legislation and amendments to 10 minutes before requiring a vote. Democrats spoke for an hour prior to the adoption of the calendar, raising concerns about the bill and objections to the process.
Rep. Pebblin Warren, D-Tuskegee, cited a person who testified against the bill Tuesday at a public hearing at the House Health Committee that looked “more masculine than any man in this room” and informed the committee he was born a woman. Under the legislation, that person would have to go into a women’s restroom.
“So that within itself needs some in depth discussions as to how people of that portrait can be going into a ladies’ restroom because we say she’s a female,” Warren said.
Rep. Napoleon Bracy, D-Prichard, said 10 minutes is not enough time to debate a controversial bill.
“It’s a big deal. It’s a controversial topic,” Bracy said. “To give it just 10 minutes doesn’t do it justice.”
House Rules Committee Chair Joe Lovvorn, R-Auburn, said to Bracy that the House was trying to pass legislation quickly to accommodate for the committee meetings Wednesday.
“Since we’re doing a three day week, we have committees meeting all day today, so our time is restricted,” Lovvorn said. “The first bill on the calendar, for instance, is one that we debated and dealt with last year.”
DuBose has filed similar legislation for the past two years. She said there have been six public hearings on the bill and it is needed because “woman” is used in Alabama law 149 times.
Rep. Neil Rafferty, D-Birmingham, offered an amendment that would prevent surveillance cameras from being used in private spaces to determine the sex of a person. However, it failed 74-24. DuBose said surveillance had nothing to do with this bill.
“If we’d added an amendment, it would have to go back up to the Senate debate,” DuBose said. “It’s not something that needed to be included in this bill, and if it’s something that, if we want to consider it needs to be a separate, stand-alone bill.”
Rafferty said the failure of his amendment made him think that the protection of women and girls is not the actual aim of the bill.
“It made me feel like the premise of trying to protect women and girls was not the actual aim of this bill,” he said. “My biggest concern of consequences would be sex-based discrimination.”
The bill also allows single sex spaces to exist. DuBose said that these spaces would not be required to exist nor created under the law, but allows places like dorm rooms, rape crisis centers and prisons to be protected for only women as defined by the bill.
“Those are spaces that could be protected for women only, as women are defined,” she said. “Now this bill does not require that or create that, but it allows for them to exist or to be created.”
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