A trans woman who is 20 years old went into a women’s bathroom in the Florida State Capitol to protest a law that doesn’t allow trans people to use those bathrooms. She was jailed for 24 hours.
The New York Times reports that Marcy Rheintgen, who is from Illinois, went to the state house in Tallahassee on March 19 and told the police, “I am here to break the law.”
The police told her at first that she would get a trespass warning if she went in, The Times reported. After that, she went to a bathroom on the second floor of the House office and stayed there for 30 to 60 seconds before being told to leave.
In an interview with the Times, she said, “I had planned to pray the rosary, but I didn’t have enough time.” “They told me to leave while I was washing my hands.”
They then caught Rheintgen for misdemeanour trespassing and put him in jail for 24 hours, according to The Associated Press. If she is found guilty, she will spend 60 days in jail and have to pay a $500 fine. Her hearing is set for May.
“Trans issues have reached a fever pitch in terms of the climate.” And some people are making us less human. There was a time when she thought, “If I don’t go to jail now, I’m going to go to jail later.” She said this in a 23-minute video that was posted on X on Monday. “It’s getting scary.”
The “Safety in Private Spaces Act,” which was passed in 2023, says that people who go into a bathroom or changing room that doesn’t match their given sex are breaking the law. This rule is for places owned by the government, prisons, and schools.
In the years since 2021, at least 19 states have passed some kind of rule against transgender people using bathrooms.
The American Civil Liberties Union says Rheintgen’s case is the first time they know of someone being arrested for breaking a rule against transgender people using bathrooms.
The New York Times was told by Florida police that Rheintgen was arrested for “trespass on property after warning,” not the state’s toilet rule. The Florida Department of Law Enforcement was asked for comment by HuffPost, but they did not reply right away.
Rheintgen said in her Monday film, “I just want respect.”
She also said that being locked up was “really isolating and lonely,” which made her cry almost the whole time. “I felt like a wild animal.”
Rheintgen called Florida officials ahead of her protest and arrest to let them know what she was going to do. She even put a picture of herself in it.
Rheintgen told the Miami Herald in a letter, “I know that you know in your heart that this law is wrong and unfair.” “I know that deep down you understand that transgender people are also people, and you can’t jail us.”
A human rights group called Equality Florida spoke out against Rheintgen’s arrest on April 1.
“Marcy Rheintgen’s arrest is not for safety reasons.” It’s about being mean, making people feel bad, and destroying their respect on purpose. Transgender people have been using toilets aligned with their gender for generations without incident. “What’s changed is not their presence, but a wave of laws meant to scare them out of public life,” Nadine Smith, Executive Director of Equality Florida, said.
“These laws are mostly not enforced.” It’s a good reason: keeping an eye on people’s bodies and names in bathrooms is silly and dangerous, Smith said. “You can only stay in a public place for a certain amount of time if you can’t safely or legally use the toilet.” That’s the point. No one is safe because of these rules. They make it harder for transgender people to live their normal lives, which limits their freedom and leaves them open to being harassed or arrested.
