Less than 24 hours after Stephanie Martinez was carjacked and mugged, the transgender activist took to the Capitol to give lawmakers a piece of her mind about the so-called bathroom bills.

She sat before a Senate committee dais Friday — in a blue-and-white striped dress covered by a black wrap sweater, her face naked of makeup and framed by glasses, bruises still visible — and delivered her remarks.

"This bill is not about safety, this bill is not about bathrooms," Martinez told the panel of lawmakers, largely supporters of the bill, which would restrict bathroom access for transgender Texans. "This bill is about limiting my ability to navigate public life."

Then, she added: "I was attacked yesterday. I am here today, as a survivor."

Twenty hours earlier and almost 20 miles away, the 48-year-old met with a man she first contacted through an online chat room, who called himself "Jay" and said he wanted to know more about transgender issues, she recounted. They agreed to meet.

"I told him, ‘I’ll meet you, no problem,’" Martinez said in an interview with the American-Statesman. "I’m an activist, I’m very out there and open in the community."

She drove up to his apartment on the far northwest side of town. The plan, she said, was to pick him up and go to a nearby restaurant to talk. They chatted for a few minutes, he told her he would be right back. But, when he returned, he brought a second man, who climbed into the back and claimed to have a gun.

They told her to drive, giving specific directions, she told police in court papers filed Friday, before they ended up in a residential neighborhood.

The man in the back seat told her to pull forward to the end of the street, Martinez told police, before instructing her to get out of the car and walk to the back of an abandoned fourplex on at the end of Schick Road.

That’s where the beating began, she told officers. The second man punched her in the face, sending her tumbling to the ground. In an arrest affidavit, she described how he then tried to grab her purse, but she held on. He punched Martinez again as they continued to struggle, the affidavit said. Then, he found a heavy wood log and lifted it up as if he was about to use it to bash her head in, she told police.

"All I thought was, ‘This is how this ends,’ she said. "‘This is how I end up dying.’"

Martinez let go of her purse. The two men grabbed it and left her behind. She knocked on doors of nearby homes until someone answered and called police.

Austin police named Raymond Deloach Jr., 26, as a suspect Friday, charging him with aggravated robbery and aggravated kidnapping. Another man was being questioned by detectives and Martinez said Friday she would be looking at a photo lineup for the second suspect.

"I feel like the whole thing was targeted based on being transgender," she said. "And I think it’s these kinds of laws" — referring to the bathroom bill — "that are making that happen."

The legislation is, perhaps, the most hotly contested of the special session. It would ban local governments and school districts from establishing policies to allow transgender Texans to use bathrooms and locker rooms that match their gender identity.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has pushed hard for the measure, arguing it is necessary to protect the privacy of women in bathrooms.

But Texas House Speaker Joe Straus and the state’s business community, who say the bill could damage the state’s ability to attract talent and tourism, find themselves aligned with LGBT activists, who pointed out that current law already bans peeping, molestation and assault — and that no incidents involving transgender individuals in Texas restrooms have been reported.

"Gov. Abbott, Dan Patrick and the other politicians who have put forward anti-trans legislation — what you do has real-world consequences," Martinez said in her testimony Friday at the Capitol. "I am this consequence."

The senators had no questions for Martinez afterward.