Arkansas General Assembly
The Arkansas General Assembly is the state's bicameral legislature, made up of the Senate and the House of Representatives. Entries naming it record acts it passed, most appearing alongside the governor who signed them. Its measures in the archive concentrate on restrictions affecting transgender residents and on legal protections for those who decline to provide particular services or care.
2025 Events (6)
Arkansas enacted Act 979 creating a special malpractice cause of action against providers of gender-affirming care to minors
On April 22, 2025, Arkansas enacted Act 979 (HB1916), signed by Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, amending the state's 2023 Protecting Minors From Medical Malpractice Act to include gender-affirming interventions as a right of action for medical malpractice. The law lets minors or their representatives sue health care professionals over puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and related care, singling out that treatment for a bespoke civil cause of action. Sponsored by Rep. Mary Bentley and Sen. Alan Clark, it passed 73-16 in the House and 29-6 in the Senate.
Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed Act 955, restricting restrooms and sleeping quarters to biological sex with a private right to sue
On April 21, 2025, Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed SB486, enacted as Act 955 of 2025, requiring multi-occupancy restrooms, changing rooms, and sleeping quarters in covered entities — including correctional facilities, domestic-violence shelters, and other public accommodations — to be designated for and restricted to a single biological sex. The law creates a private civil cause of action allowing individuals to sue covered entities for damages if they encounter a person of the opposite biological sex in such a facility, effectively barring transgender people from facilities matching their gender identity. Covered entities must take reasonable steps, such as signage and policy, to enforce the sex-based designation.
Arkansas Gov. Sanders signed Act 970, letting providers and insurers refuse gender-transition and other care on conscience grounds
On April 21, 2025, Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed SB444, enacted as Act 970 of 2025, amending the state's 2021 Medical Ethics and Diversity Act to broaden conscience-based refusal rights in health care. The amendment newly extends the right to decline to participate in health care services to insurers alongside practitioners and institutions, and protects refusing to take part in gender-transition procedures, abortion, assisted suicide, or any service that violates a conscience. It also lets religious health care institutions make staffing and privileging decisions consistent with their religious beliefs.
Arkansas Gov. Sanders signed Act 711, barring the 'X' marker and requiring only 'M' or 'F' sex designations on state IDs
On April 16, 2025, Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed House Bill 1796, enacted as Act 711 of 2025, requiring that driver's licenses and state identification cards display gender information as only "M" for male or "F" for female. The law prohibits issuing an ID with an "X" designation or no gender information and ties the marker to the applicant's birth certificate or other identity document, requiring an amended birth certificate to change it. The statute codifies a state rule that had removed the nonbinary option and the pathway transgender and nonbinary Arkansans used to correct their sex designation.
Arkansas enacted Act 677 shielding government workers and licensed professionals who refuse duties over religious beliefs about marriage or sex
On April 16, 2025, Arkansas enacted Act 677 (HB1615), the "religious nondiscrimination" law, signed by Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders. The statute bars the state from denying licenses, certifications, contracts, or employment consequences to individuals and organizations that decline to provide services conflicting with a "sincerely held religious belief, including a belief about biological sex or marriage," and expressly permits government employees authorized to license or solemnize marriages to recuse themselves on that basis. Civil-rights advocates say it authorizes identity-based refusals of public services and licensed professional care to LGBTQ+ Arkansans.
Arkansas Gov. Sanders signed the Keep Kids First Act, letting faith-based foster and adoption agencies refuse LGBTQ prospective parents
On April 10, 2025, Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed House Bill 1669, the "Keep Kids First Act" (Act 509 of 2025), barring the state from requiring faith-based adoption and foster-care providers to make placements that conflict with their sincerely held religious or moral beliefs. The law also prohibits the state from penalizing a provider for considering prospective parents based on the provider's religious beliefs about sexual orientation or gender identity. In effect, it lets state-contracted agencies decline to place children with same-sex couples and LGBTQ prospective foster and adoptive parents.
2023 Events (7)
Arkansas enacted the Conscience Protection Act, Act 733, shielding religious refusals from state penalties
On April 12, 2023, Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed House Bill 1615 into law as Act 733 of the 2023 Regular Session, the "Conscience Protection Act." The law amends Arkansas's Religious Freedom Restoration Act to shift the burden of proof onto government and mandate broad construction favoring religious exercise, and it creates a new subchapter barring state government from adverse action — denying tax exemptions, grants, contracts, licenses, certifications, or employment benefits — against a person, business, or religious organization because of a sincerely held religious belief "including a belief about biological sex or marriage." Supporters framed it as a religious-freedom protection, while LGBTQ+ advocates warned it authorizes identity-based refusals shielded from state consequence.
Arkansas Gov. Sanders signed SB270 (Act 619) criminalizing transgender adults' restroom use under the child sexual-indecency statute
On April 11, 2023, Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed Senate Bill 270 into law as Act 619, amending the criminal offense of "sexual indecency with a child" to add a Class C misdemeanor for an adult who, to arouse or gratify sexual desire, enters or remains in a public changing facility "assigned to persons of the opposite sex" while knowing a minor of the opposite sex is present. The law defines "sex" as immutable biological sex determined at birth and defines "public changing facility" to include restrooms, locker rooms, and showers, functionally criminalizing transgender adults' use of facilities matching their gender identity when a minor is present. A third offense escalates to a Class D felony.
Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed the Given Name Act restricting school staff use of trans students' names and pronouns
On April 11, 2023, Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed House Bill 1468, the "Given Name Act," into law as Act 542 of 2023. The law bars public-school, charter, and higher-education employees from addressing an unemancipated minor with a pronoun, title, or name inconsistent with the student's biological sex or birth certificate without written parental permission, and creates a private right of action for violations. It also shields employees from adverse action and students from discipline for declining to use a person's preferred name or pronoun.
Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed Act 317, barring transgender students from school restrooms matching their gender identity
On March 21, 2023, Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed HB1156 into law as Act 317, requiring K-12 public and open-enrollment charter schools to designate multiple-occupancy restrooms, locker rooms, and changing areas by a student's sex as listed on their original birth certificate. The law bars transgender students from facilities matching their gender identity and imposes minimum $1,000 fines on superintendents, principals, or teachers found noncompliant.
Arkansas Gov. Sanders signed SB199 (Act 274) creating special malpractice liability for gender-affirming care providers of minors
On March 13, 2023, Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed SB199 into law as Act 274, the Protecting Minors From Medical Malpractice Act of 2023, creating a dedicated civil right of action letting a minor or a representative sue a health care professional who performs a "gender transition procedure." The law exposes those clinicians to compensatory and punitive damages and lets a patient sue for up to 15 years after turning 18, far longer than Arkansas's standard two-year malpractice window. It was sponsored by Sen. Gary Stubblefield and Rep. Mary Bentley and passed both chambers along party lines.
Arkansas Gov. Sanders signed the LEARNS Act barring public-school instruction on gender identity and sexual orientation before grade five
On March 8, 2023, Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed Senate Bill 294, the LEARNS Act, into law as Act 237 of 2023, a K-12 education omnibus. Section 16 of the enacted Act created Ark. Code § 6-16-157(c), which prohibits public school teachers from providing classroom instruction on "gender identity" or "sexual orientation" to students before the fifth grade. Observers compared the provision to Florida's law that critics call "Don't Say Gay."
Arkansas enacted Act 131 restricting 'adult-oriented performances' after narrowing an explicit drag ban
On February 24, 2023, Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed Senate Bill 43 into law as Act 131, adding a definition of "adult-oriented performance" to state code and barring such performances on public property, with public funds, or where minors are present. As introduced, the bill explicitly defined drag by reference to a performer's gender identity and classified it as a regulated adult-oriented business, but sponsors rewrote it twice to remove all references to drag and gender identity after opposition from LGBTQ advocates and the ACLU of Arkansas. The enacted content-based version reframed the restriction around nudity, prosthetic genitalia, and appeals to the "prurient interest."
2021 Events (3)
Arkansas Gov. Hutchinson signed SB450, adding AG enforcement to the state's transgender sports ban
On April 27, 2021, Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson signed SB450, the "Gender Integrity Reinforcement Legislation for Sports (GIRLS) Act," into law as Act 953 of 2021, roughly a month after signing the state's first sex-based sports-eligibility law, SB354. The law requires K-12 and postsecondary athletic teams sponsored by state-funded entities to be designated by sex based on anatomy and genetics at birth, bars students of "the male sex" from female-designated teams, and creates a civil cause of action letting the Attorney General sue non-complying schools for injunctive relief plus a one-year bar on receiving public funds.
Arkansas legislature overrode veto to enact HB1570/Act 626, banning gender-affirming care for minors
On April 6, 2021, the Arkansas House (72-25) and Senate (25-8) voted to override Governor Asa Hutchinson's veto and enact HB1570 as Act 626, the "Arkansas Save Adolescents from Experimentation (SAFE) Act." The law bars physicians from providing gender-transition medical care to anyone under 18 and bars public or private insurance from covering such care for minors, making Arkansas the first state to enact this kind of ban.
Arkansas Gov. Hutchinson signed SB354, barring transgender athletes from girls' and women's school sports
On March 25, 2021, Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson signed SB354, the "Fairness in Women's Sports Act," into law as Act 461 of 2021. The law limits K-12 and college athletic teams designated for females to students whose biological sex is female, barring transgender girls and women from competing on those teams, and creates a private cause of action for a student or school harmed by a violation. Sponsored by Sen. Missy Irvin and Rep. Jim Barker, the bill passed the Arkansas Senate on March 10, 2021, and the House on March 22, 2021, before reaching Hutchinson's desk.
2015 Events (1)
Arkansas Gov. Hutchinson allowed SB202 to become law without his signature, nullifying Fayetteville's LGBT ordinance
On February 24, 2015, Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson allowed SB202 to become Act 137 without his signature, barring Arkansas cities and counties from adopting nondiscrimination protections broader than state law. The measure nullified Fayetteville's LGBT-inclusive nondiscrimination ordinance and preempted similar local measures statewide.