No preferred pronouns, Senate says

CHEYENNE — The state Senate has passed a bill out of committee to prohibit Wyoming from requiring anyone to refer to people by their preferred pronouns.

Sen. Lynn Hutchings, R-Cheyenne, told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday that Senate File 77, “Compelled speech is not free speech,” was brought to her by a constituent, and “simply states … that the state and its political subdivisions shall not compel or require an employee to refer to another employee using that employee’s preferred pronouns.”

Hutchings said there are people who use pronouns that are “pretty much made up, and (it)

would be hard for any employee to try to keep up with in the workplace.”

Ben Moritz, executive director of the Wyoming Community College Commission, said that while his organization did not have an official position on the bill, he had heard concerns that SF 77 could have a chilling effect on academic discourse and hiring procedures.

“This is about a prohibition on being forced to use a pronoun. There is a context and an atmosphere around those discussions, and that is where we have heard some concerns from faculty in particular that, will this make having frank and open discussions more difficult?” Mortiz said.

Sara Burlingame, executive director of Wyoming Equality, said that SF 77 is another in a line of bills introduced this session that fundamentally promotes “bullying.”

However, Nathan Winters with Wyoming Family Alliance spoke in support of SF 77.

“It is fine for one to believe something about themselves, even if it doesn’t line up with the reality,” Winters said. “Yet, when they compel someone else to acquiesce to their own belief, that is problematic because it forces that individual into what they would believe to be a lie.”

All five senators on the committee voted to pass SF 77, which will go to the full body for debate on the floor.

This story was published on January 29, 2025.