State’s Republicans used gerrymandering to push restrictions on trans healthcare and strict voter identification laws

In June, 2022, Nick Zingarelli and his family packed their bags and left St Louis.

His daughter had shared with them she was transgender just two years earlier, and Missouri lawmakers were in the midst of passing a raft of anti-trans bills, including a ban on gender-affirming care for minors.

They moved to Cincinnati, where the family had lived years before, viewing it as a possible refuge from the legislative attacks. Zingarelli thought Ohio would be “a more moderate place, a more rational and logical place”, with the centrist-leaning Republican governor, Mike DeWine, at the helm. “It seemed like at least leadership was willing to be the rational adults in the room,” he said.

He was half right. DeWine, who had himself in January created some restrictions on trans healthcare in the state, vetoed a bill from Ohio Republicans to ban gender-affirming care for minors last December, saying that many parents of trans kids had told him “their child would be dead today if they had not received the treatment they received from an Ohio children’s hospital”. But it didn’t matter. Using their supermajorities in the state legislature, Republicans voted to override DeWine’s veto last week and banned trans youth from accessing potentially life-saving treatments like hormone replacement therapy and puberty blockers.

Their brazen move illustrates just how secure Republicans are in their control of Ohio’s legislature. Democrats and Republicans alike have used gerrymandering to win legislative majorities, but the GOP has perfected the art, pouring money into state redistricting battles across the country in an explicit strategy to remake statehouses to their advantage.