Anti-Trans Activists Are Allegedly Harassing People Who Decline to Sign Their Petitions. What Are Your Rights to Counter Them?

Seth Kirby, chair of trans advocacy group Washington Won't Discriminate, addresses a crowd at a rally in February. Washington Won't Discriminate

In February, anti-trans activist group Just Want Privacy revamped their efforts to police transgender people's genitals in bathrooms by launching I-1552, a new bigoted bill that would bar trans students in public schools from using restrooms that correspond to their gender identities. The initiative also scraps state protections for trans people by allowing businesses and state agencies to keep trans people out of gender-segregated bathrooms. Just Want Privacy failed to repeal Washington State human rights protections for trans people in 2016.

Campaign volunteers are now out gathering signatures to get the initiative on the November ballot.

Sakara Remmu and her 15-year-old son encountered one of these anti-trans petitioners outside of a Renton Walmart while waiting for an Uber ride on May 20. After confirming Remmu was a registered voter, the man presented her with two petition clipboards: one to "keep the boys in the boys bathroom and girls in girls bathroom," and another to ban King County from opening safe-injection sites. Remmu declined to sign either of the petitions.

"He was so visibly appalled and disgusted when I said I wasn’t going to sign the bathroom bill," she recalled.

The man walked away and began mocking Remmu "in a menacing way," she said. But then the man returned.

"'Excuse me young lady,'" Remmu remembered him saying. "That was a red flag."

And then he grabbed her by the elbow, she alleged.

Remmu, who is familiar with signature-gathering and campaigning, said she told him not to touch her and that he was breaking the law. And she's not exaggerating.

If a petitioner physically touches someone, "technically it is an assault" and one would "have the right to ask law enforcement to tell them to stop," stated a recent guide (PDF) from the American Civil Liberties Union. However, police officers are unlikely to press charges for "minor touching," it cautioned.

But not everyone feels comfortable calling the police in these situations. Remmu, who is Black, said she didn't call local police because she was concerned her interaction with the anti-trans signature-gatherer could be taken out of context.

"Sometimes Black people call [the police] as victims and then they assume the Black people are [the perpetrators]," she said. "I was totally shaken by that. Especially because the climate of people having the audacity to violate other people in public based on their race, that they’re Muslim, that they’re female."

Although she didn't file a police report, Remmu posted about her interaction with the petitioner on Facebook to make sure her friends knew their rights in these situations.

Sakara Remmu, right, said the anti-trans signature-gatherer, seen above in a black shirt and jeans, grabbed her by the elbow when she declined to sign his petition. Courtesy of Sakara Remmu

Signature-gathering is a free speech right protected under the First Amendment. But the rights of petitioners and their detractors have limits, according to the ACLU.

What laws control what I can do in opposing signature gatherers?

Basically, all the laws that would control your getting into an argument with someone about which football team is best also apply – no disturbing the peace, no unconsented touching, etc. With petitions, however, there is one specific law, RCW 29A.84.250(4), which makes it a gross misdemeanor if a person “Interferes with or attempts to interfere with the right of any voter to sign or not to sign an initiative or referendum petition or with the right to vote for or against an initiative or referendum measure by threats, intimidation, or any other corrupt means or practice”.

"Initiatives are part of the democratic process in Washington," said Doug Honig, the ACLU of Washington's communications director. "People have a right to gather signatures for initiatives that go all across political spectrum... It's important that rights be respected, but at same time, people who want to encourage [others] to not sign a particular initiative, they have the right express that view."

The guide also has some suggestions for staying out of trouble.

The thing most likely to get you in trouble is getting into a noisy (or even physical) altercation with the petition gatherer. As both a legal and a tactical strategy, keep your cool. If the petition gatherer starts getting noisy, stay calm yourself. Ignore them if necessary, and concentrate on connecting with the public. The public respects people who keep their cool.

This isn't the first time someone gathering signatures for Just Want Privacy has harassed someone opposed to their bigoted bill. Earlier this month, trans rights advocate Maddie Crisman claimed a man gathering signatures outside a Fred Meyer in Ellensburg became incensed when she began talking to passersby. When Crisman asked the man, identified as Larry Bradshaw in a police report, to stop yelling at her, he allegedly "'swore, threw his clipboard down on the ground, flicked a cigarette at me and threw his pen at me and hit me in the head,'” she told The Daily Record.

Representatives from the Just Want Privacy campaign did not immediately respond to requests for comment.