A Tennessee state lawmaker filed a series of anti-LGBTQ+ bills this week, challenging the Supreme Court Obergefell decision, threatening anti-discrimination protections and attempting to ban pride flags and symbols on state property.
The bills by Rep. Gino Bulso, R-Brentwood, are not new ideas from the conservative lawmaker, some of which have failed in prior iterations, but may serve as escalations to recent wins for the Republican supermajority targeting protections for minority groups.
Bulso, who did not respond to requests for comment on Wednesday, introduced three related bills late Tuesday.
The first bill, House Bill 1472, is titled the “Banning Bostock Act,” and seeks to exclude sexual orientation, gender identity and abortion-related acts from the definition of sex-based discrimination, a direct challenge to the 2020 Bostock v. Clayton County decision, in which the U.S. Supreme Court deemed they were included in sex discrimination protections.
In another test of the high court, Bulso’s House Bill 1473, Bulso takes on Obergefell v. Hodges, the landmark 2015 ruling that granted same-sex couples the right to marry. The bill would build on a 2024 state law defining marriage as between one man and one woman.