{"id":2371249,"date":"2024-11-20T12:26:01","date_gmt":"2024-11-20T17:26:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/mi-bills-would-give-exclusive-privileges-to-trans-people-alleging-violence\/"},"modified":"2024-11-20T12:29:29","modified_gmt":"2024-11-20T17:29:29","slug":"mi-bills-would-give-exclusive-privileges-to-trans-people-alleging-violence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/mi-bills-would-give-exclusive-privileges-to-trans-people-alleging-violence\/","title":{"rendered":"MI Bills Would Give Exclusive Privileges To Trans People Alleging Violence"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">22<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fmi-bills-would-give-exclusive-privileges-to-trans-people-alleging-violence%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2371249&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>Michigan House Democrats recently passed two bills, HB 5400 \u200cand HB 5401, which aim to\u200b enhance protections \u200dagainst hate crimes by specifically including \u2062categories such as sexual orientation\u2062 and gender identity in\u2062 the state&#8217;s legal framework. Despite existing laws that already address threats and harm, these \u2062new bills seek to broaden the definitions and\u2062 consequences of hate crimes.<\/p>\n<p>HB 5400 revises the Michigan Penal Code \u2063to define hate\u2064 crimes more expansively by eliminating \u200bthe requirement for physical contact and \u200binstead focusing on &#8220;force \u200cor violence&#8221;\u200d against individuals based on their protected characteristics. It\u2062 also outlines a range of actions that could be classified as hate\u2062 crimes,\u200b including causing\u2062 bodily harm\u200b and making threats. HB 5401 \u2064adjusts sentencing \u200bguidelines to \u2062impose prison sentences between two\u2064 and\u2062 ten years for newly classified hate crimes.<\/p>\n<p>The bills, sponsored by Democrats Noah \u200cArbit \u2062and Kristian Grant, narrowly passed with a vote of 57-52, \u200chighlighting a partisan\u2062 divide in the state House, where Democrats hold a slight majority. \u2063Supporters argue that the legislation updates \u2063outdated laws to better protect against hate-driven violence,\u200d especially in light of recent events, \u200dwhile critics express concern about potential overreach and \u200bmisuse, alleging that\u200b such laws \u2064could\u2064 be employed to\u2064 unfairly target individuals\u200d for their \u200dexpressions or statements.<\/p>\n<p>Republican opponents \u2064raise worries about the \u2062implications of the\u200d bills, suggesting they may lead \u2064to excessive\u200d charges that could damage reputations and finances, regardless of whether the charges \u2063hold up in court. In response, Democrats assert that the laws will not criminalize free speech but will only apply to violent actions, \u200demphasizing the need for\u200b proof of intent in hate crime prosecutions. The bills are expected to advance to\u200d the Senate, where further\u200b debates and votes will \u2062occur.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Michigan House Democrats passed two bills last week that would carve out exclusive protections against so-called &ldquo;hate crimes&rdquo; for individuals based on certain categories like sexual orientation, gender identity, and religion, among others. Lawmakers voted to pass such provisions despite current <a href=\"https:\/\/www.legislature.mi.gov\/Laws\/MCL?objectName=mcl-750-483a\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">laws<\/a> already in place to protect citizens from threats, <a href=\"https:\/\/legislature.mi.gov\/Laws\/MCL?objectName=MCL-750-81#:~:text=(1)%20Except%20as%20otherwise%20provided,more%20than%20%24500.00%2C%20or%20both.\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">harm<\/a>, and intimidation.<\/p>\n<p>Democrats in the state House passed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.legislature.mi.gov\/Bills\/Bill?ObjectName=2024-HB-5400\">HB 5400<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.legislature.mi.gov\/Bills\/Bill?ObjectName=2024-HB-5401\">HB 5401<\/a> last week. The first bill would, according to a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.legislature.mi.gov\/documents\/2023-2024\/billanalysis\/House\/pdf\/2023-HLA-5400-0B0796B1.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">legislative analysis<\/a> of the bills, &ldquo;amend the Michigan Penal Code to revise its hate crime provisions,&rdquo; in part by adding sexual orientation and &ldquo;gender identity or expression,&rdquo; among other things, to its list of protected attributes. The second bill would &ldquo;amend the sentencing guidelines &hellip; to include the new felonies proposed by HB 5400.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>HB 5400, as passed by the house, removes the qualifier of &ldquo;physical contact&rdquo; from its description of possible hate crimes, replacing it with the use of &ldquo;force or violence against another individual&rdquo; because of his inclusion in a protected class. Causing bodily injury, stalking, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/investigation-opened-after-500-french-far-left-extremists-riot-after-election\/\" title=\"Investigation Opened After 500 French Far-Left Extremists Riot After Election\">causing property damage<\/a>, or threatening to do so &ldquo;based in whole or in part&rdquo; on one of the protected characteristics also qualifies as a hate crime under the bill. HB 5401 prescribes <a href=\"https:\/\/www.legislature.mi.gov\/Bills\/Bill?ObjectName=2024-HB-5401\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">sentences<\/a> ranging between two and 10 years in prison, depending on the supposed offense.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Michigan law already <a href=\"https:\/\/legislature.mi.gov\/Laws\/MCL?objectName=MCL-750-81#:~:text=(1)%20Except%20as%20otherwise%20provided,more%20than%20%24500.00%2C%20or%20both.\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">bans<\/a> physical assault and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.legislature.mi.gov\/Laws\/MCL?objectName=mcl-750-483a\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">threats or intimidation<\/a> across the board, and the 14th Amendment already ensures the government provides all citizens with &ldquo;the equal protection of the laws.&rdquo; Acts or threats of violence against individuals or groups are also not protected under the First Amendment. <\/p>\n<p>Both bills are sponsored by Democrat state Reps. <a href=\"https:\/\/housedems.com\/noah-arbit\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Noah Arbit<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/housedems.com\/kristian-grant\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Kristian Grant<\/a>. The bills <a href=\"https:\/\/www.legislature.mi.gov\/Bills\/Bill?ObjectName=2024-HB-5401\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">narrowly<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.legislature.mi.gov\/Bills\/Bill?ObjectName=2024-HB-5400\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">passed<\/a> the state House by 57-52, &ldquo;with one Republican &hellip; joining all Democrats in approving the legislation,&rdquo; as the Michigan Advance <a href=\"https:\/\/michiganadvance.com\/2024\/11\/14\/michigan-house-passes-update-to-36-year-old-hate-crimes-law-amid-heated-debate\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">reported<\/a>. Democrats have a narrow majority in the state House, <a href=\"https:\/\/ballotpedia.org\/Michigan_House_of_Representatives\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">controlling<\/a> 56 seats to Republicans&rsquo; 54.<\/p>\n<p>Republican state Sen. Jim Runestad told The Federalist the Democrat-controlled Senate will likely pass the bills in December, during its final weeks of session.<\/p>\n<h2>Possible Consequences<\/h2>\n<p>While a person prosecuted under this bill might be able to convince a court he is innocent because he was &ldquo;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.legislature.mi.gov\/documents\/2023-2024\/billengrossed\/House\/pdf\/2024-HEBH-5400.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">unaware<\/a>&rdquo; his actions could be seen as &ldquo;threatening violence,&rdquo; a caveat that HB 5400 supposedly carves out, Runestad expressed concern that prosecutors could tack on these hate crime charges to other offenses, increasing one&rsquo;s penalty.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;You could have a confrontation with somebody and then use the wrong pronoun, and thus get it escalated from a regular crime into a hate crime with additional penalties,&rdquo; he said. <\/p>\n<p>Runestad also voiced concern that, while the charges may not always hold up in court, prosecutors could still politically weaponize the charges, bankrupting the finances and reputation of the accused even if he is ultimately found innocent.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Now what you&rsquo;ve done to the other person who&rsquo;s been charged or had this allegation thrown at them, you oftentimes destroy them, because the media will pick that up all day long,&rdquo; he told The Federalist. &ldquo;It breaks you. It destroys you. You go bankrupt.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Republican state Rep. Matt Hall &mdash; who will serve as House <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fox17online.com\/news\/local-news\/michigan\/rep-matt-hall-selected-as-next-michigan-house-speaker\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">speaker<\/a> when Republicans gain control &mdash; <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/RepMattHall\/status\/1856409312505278962\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">suggested<\/a> on X before the bills were passed that prosecutors could potentially use these bills to target people for saying there are only two sexes online.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;After losing majority, House Democrats want to ram through woke bills to allow prosecutors to go after people for stating there are only two genders on social media,&rdquo; Hall wrote last week referring to the bills. &ldquo;Michiganders don&rsquo;t want this. This absurd, radical, out-of-touch agenda must stop.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Arbit told The Federalist &mdash; also before the bills passed the state House last week &mdash; that they would not criminalize &ldquo;misgendering.&rdquo; He also said that the bills would not affect the right to free speech protected under the First Amendment and that they only apply to &ldquo;violent acts.&rdquo; He also indicated he sponsored the proposed legislation in <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2024\/05\/02\/republicans-antisemitism-bill-merely-gives-feds-more-power-to-trample-free-speech\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">response<\/a> to &ldquo;antisemitic violence&rdquo; following the Oct. 7 terror attacks against Israel.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Michigan has had a hate crime law for over 35 years, since 1988, on the books. So this isn&rsquo;t a new law, it&rsquo;s just updating it to increase the penalties and ensure more groups targeted by hate crimes are covered,&rdquo; Arbit told The Federalist.<\/p>\n<p>When asked about safeguards in place to prevent subjective prosecution regarding the provisions, Arbit noted how <a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/3YuVZYV\">hate crime prosecutions require proof<\/a> of motive, which makes the burden of proof higher. He also claimed &ldquo;[p]rosecutors won&rsquo;t charge a hate crime in Michigan&rdquo; without &ldquo;extraordinarily compelling evidence&rdquo; to prove guilt.<\/p>\n<p>Arbit said there are similar hate crime statutes in most states, but that &ldquo;there have not been issues raised in those states of overzealous prosecution.&rdquo; He claimed that &ldquo;Michigan will not be different.&rdquo; <\/p>\n<p>But recent years have <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2024\/04\/02\/j-k-rowling-dares-scottish-police-to-arrest-her-for-breaking-law-that-makes-it-a-hate-crime-to-call-a-man-a-man\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">demonstrated<\/a> that hate crime <a href=\"https:\/\/dailycaller.com\/2019\/02\/18\/hoax-hate-crimes-list\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">hoaxes<\/a> can <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2024\/02\/14\/news\/florida-man-dylan-brewer-arrested-for-vandalising-lgbtq-pride-mural\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">quickly<\/a> become <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2020\/08\/11\/kamala-harris-called-jussie-smolletts-hate-crime-hoax-a-modern-day-lynching\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">commonplace<\/a>. Runestad expressed concern that these bills could enable a false sense of hysteria over alleged &ldquo;hate crime.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;These false allegations are pandemic. They are by the thousands and thousands, and virtually never is the person charged for the false allegation,&rdquo; Runestad said. <\/p>\n<p>Republicans <a href=\"https:\/\/www.freep.com\/story\/news\/politics\/elections\/2024\/11\/06\/michigan-republicans-claim-state-house-victory\/75997687007\/\">won<\/a> back the state House during the recent election, likely obstructing the current Democrat &ldquo;trifecta&rdquo; of power between Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, the state legislature, and the state supreme court.<\/p>\n<p>The Federalist reached out to state Rep. Kristian Grant, the other Democrat who sponsored the bills passed by the state House, but did not receive a reply.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>      Logan Washburn is a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/lawsuit-clark-county-keeps-commercial-addresses-on-voter-rolls\/\" title=\"Lawsuit: Clark County Keeps Commercial Addresses On Voter Rolls\">staff writer covering election integrity<\/a>. He graduated from Hillsdale College, served as Christopher Rufo&#8217;s editorial assistant, and has bylines in The Wall Street Journal, The Tennessean, and The Daily Caller. Logan is originally from Central Oregon but now lives in rural Michigan.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Michigan House Democrats approved two bills for enhanced &#8220;hate crime&#8221; protections based on categories like sexual orientation and religion, despite existing laws<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":507,"featured_media":2371250,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/pexels-photo-6054382.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[40751,45380,23850,45381],"class_list":["post-2371249","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-legislative-update","tag-mi-bills","tag-trans-rights","tag-violence-allegations"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/pexels-photo-6054382.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2371249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/507"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2371249"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2371249\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2371253,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2371249\/revisions\/2371253"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2371250"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2371249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2371249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2371249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}