Senate committee advances bill restricting preferred pronoun mandates

A bill that would prevent public employees and state contractors from being forced to comply with an individual’s requested pronoun usage moved through its first committee amid plenty of backlash from critics.

The Senate Government Oversight and Accountability Committee advanced the “Freedom of Conscience in the Workplace Act” (SB 440) on a 5-2 vote with Senators breaking along party lines. The often contentious meeting included several citizens calling lawmakers “bigots” and saying the bill would allow job discrimination against LGBTQ individuals. Republican Sen. Randy Fine at one point also derided a citizen’s Arabic keffiyeh as a “terrorist rag.”

“I’m the chairman,” said Fine, a Palm Bay Republican. “I can say what I want. If you don’t like it you can leave.”

Sen. Stan McClain, an Ocala Republican and the bill’s sponsors, said the legislation would not hurt the job prospects of any Floridians to obtain gainful employment. Instead, it would protect the conscience of individuals who do not want to use preferred pronouns for those claiming something beside their gender assigned at birth.

The bill would also require any government forms to identify employees as male or female. The bill applies to public employees and state contractors, not private employers, McClain stressed.

“The policy of the state is that there are only two genders,” McClain said.

But numerous transgender activists, many asking lawmakers to use “they/them” pronouns, said the bill was an intrusion and a waste of time.

Equality Florida has derided the legislation as the “Don’t Say Gay or Trans at Work” bill, and lobbied against the policy.

Sanford City Commissioner Claudia Thomas, the first openly gay member of her City Commission, said the bill not only insults LGBTQ Floridians but will waste government resources.

“I would love to get back to trying to solve my city’s problems about water, clean water, housing, etc.” Thomas said. “And if I have to start wasting my time talking about pronouns and people not respecting my friends, it would make me sad.”

Several social conservative groups said the bill was important to pass, and said too many local governments were forcing “woke” policies mandating recognition of gender theory many oppose on a moral level.

“It ends coercive pronoun mandates. It doesn’t take anyone’s rights away,” said John Labriola, a lobbyist for the Christian Family Coalition. “A number of local counties, including here in Leon County, have woke trainings that actually force employees to learn certain pronouns. Ze is one of them. Ze, if you don’t want to be he or she.”

But nonbinary speakers said the bill effectively discriminated against a growing population of Floridians whose gender identity differs from their birth certifications.

“I’m nonbinary. I exist,” said Ash Bradley. “The debate over personal beliefs versus the rights of marginalized groups shouldn’t even be happening, especially when taxpayers are required to miss work and drive hours just to fight a bill built to make bullying acceptable in the workplace.”

Last week, activists in the Capitol hoped the bill was dead after the Senate committee declined to take it up after receiving hundreds of comment cards opposing the legislation.

But the committee did take up the bill on Tuesday and approved it. The legislation now heads to the Senate Judiciary Committee.