U.S. legislators have considered 617 anti-transgender bills in 2024 so far, the fifth consecutive record-breaking year for bills targeting trans rights, according to the independent research organizationTrans Legislation Tracker.

Of the total number of anti-trans bills, 258 are 2023 bills that were carried over from state legislatures or Congress, according to the organization’s online database, with the rest having been introduced since January 2024. Forty-four such bills have passed into law so far in 2024, which is now the fifth consecutive year the U.S. has broken its own record for anti-trans legislation that is up for consideration, the organization reported in a press release Wednesday.

“This surge of anti-trans bills isn’t slowing down,” said Andrew Bales, founder of Trans Legislation Tracker, in a statement accompanying the release. “In fact, we’re seeing legislation that broadens restrictions for healthcare, education, and legal recognition for transgender people in the United States.”

Bales noted in particular that 61 bills are currently beingconsidered at the federal level, a number they called “unprecedented.” Twenty-six deal specifically with healthcare, most of which seek to ban gender-affirming medical care for young trans people under the age of 18 with names like “Protecting Our Kids from Child Abuse” and “Protect Children’s Innocence” — slogansfrequently adopted by the far right to falsely insinuate that trans people are a danger to children.

The remaining 556 bills currently monitored by Trans Legislation Tracker are spread across 43 separate state legislatures. More than half target healthcare or educational rights, Bales reported this week. Oklahoma lawmakers have introduced the highest number of anti-trans bills in the nation so far with a total of 60, including HB 1449, whichbecame law in March and strictly redefined the term “sex” to refer only to a person’s assigned sex at birth. In second place is Missouri, where lawmakers have introduced 43 such anti-trans bills, likeHB 2885, a bill introduced by first-term state Rep. Jamie Ray Gragg, a Republican, that would make “contributing to social transition” a felony and require teachers who do so to register as sex offenders.

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Although 225 bills monitored by Trans Legislation Tracker this year have failed so far, that still leaves hundreds more working their way through the system — and the sheer scope of the political anti-trans animus on display carries its own harmful effects, even when the bills themselves don’t pass. Polls over the past several years have shown thatLGBTQ+ youth mental health, particularly that of trans youth, has sharply declined amid the spike in legislation targeting trans people.

“The end goal of anti-trans legislation is denying transgender people the words to describe our experience, the means to express it safely, and the community and support we all deserve,” said Gillian Branstetter, communications strategist at the ACLU, in astatement earlier this year.

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