Although there have been no reported hate crimes on the UW campus for the past four years, there is no way to know if that means there were no attacks or threats made against transgender students. That is because transgender people in the state of Washington are not protected by hate crime laws.

In October 2008, several Washington State University (WSU) students were attacked because of their gender expression.

The attacks encouraged the Washington Student Lobby (WSL) to push for a more inclusive definition of sexual orientation, said UW student legislative liaison David Iseminger.

Senate Bill 5952 would expand that definition.

Currently, malicious harassment — a class C felony — includes crimes based on heterosexuality, homosexuality or bisexuality. The transgender community is unprotected.

The new sexual orientation definition would match the terminology in the state’s labor regulations, found in RCW 49.60.040, an equal-opportunity labor law.

The key difference is the addition of the phrase “gender expression or identity” and its definition.

Now, hate crime laws refer to sexual orientation, which is defined as heterosexuality, homosexuality or bisexuality.

In RCW 49.60.040, sexual orientation is defined as “heterosexuality, homosexuality, bisexuality, and gender expression or identity. As used in this definition, ‘gender expression or identity’ means having or being perceived as having a gender identity, self-image, appearance, behavior, or expression, whether or not that gender identity, self-image, appearance, behavior, or expression is different from that traditionally associated with the sex assigned to that person at birth.”

“The point is that no one should be subjected to violence or to threats or intimidation because of simply who they are,” said Sen. Joe McDermott, D-34th District, the bill’s prime sponsor.

Hate crimes make campus feel less safe for all students, regardless of sexual orientation, Iseminger said. Iseminger represents the WSL and graduate students at UW.

“Safety isn’t a privilege; it is a right,” said Iseminger. “You can’t excel in an academic environment if you’re worried about your own safety.”

WSU junior Jackson Hogan, treasurer for the Gay Lesbian Bisexual Transgender Allies (GLBTA), felt that WSU administrators did not respond appropriately to the attacks, and said that the administration’s response to the assaults at WSU demonstrates that the Legislature needs to protect the transgender community.

“I was sorely disappointed in their lack of [administrative] support,” Hogan said. “I don’t think it helped increase anyone’s feeling of safety.”

So far, the bill has seen little opposition.

At the Feb. 25 Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, five people testified in favor of the bill, and no one testified against it. It was passed out of committee with unanimous bipartisan support, and it has been sent to the Senate floor calendar.

House Bill 2219, the identical companion bill to SB 5952, died in the House Public Safety & Emergency Preparedness Committee.

“[If the bill doesn’t pass,] the message students will receive is that the Legislature feels that attacks based on race, color, religion or sexual orientation are especially heinous, but that attacks based on a person’s expression of who they are, are not worthy of that same moral outrage,” said Matt Holmes of the WSL.

Reach reporter Kaitlin Strohschein at news@dailyuw.com.