Transgender activists stormed the Iowa Capitol on Thursday as lawmakers consider a bill that would eliminate “gender identity” as a protected class from state civil rights law.

“Hundreds of Iowans again packed the Iowa Capitol rotunda to protest the bill, waving pride flags, holding signs and chanting ‘no hate in our state’ and ‘you represent us.’ A line of protesters led out the building’s door as more people waited to be let inside,” the Des Moines Register reported. 

The massive protest followed a week of “heated debate” on the legislation, called House File 583, according to the report. That legislation would remove “gender identity,” — the false concept that one can identify or become a different sex than they were born as — as a protected class from the Iowa Civil Rights Act. The Iowa Civil Rights Act shield Iowans from discrimination in education, employment, housing, and more.

The hearing was the public’s final opportunity to weigh-in on the legislation, according to the report. The Republican-control House and Senate are expected to vote on the bill on Thursday and send it to Gov. Kim Reynold’s (R) desk for final approval.

“Trans rights activists storm the Iowa State Capitol as lawmakers consider a bill to remove gender identity as a protected class,” women’s sports advocate Riley Gaines said in a post to X, accompanied with a video of the pro-transgender protesters. “You CANNOT protect both sex and gender identity in law as they directly contradict each other. Stay strong, Iowa GOP.”

According to the Des Moines Register, state troopers blocked off the hallway outside the committee room where the hearing was set to take place, “hoping to avoid a repeat of Monday when protesters’ chanting drowned out testimony during a subcommittee hearing and troopers arrested two people as they attempted to push the crowd back.”

The Iowa Civil Rights Act was enacted in 1965 and outlaws discrimination based on race, creed, color, sex, national origin, religion, and disability. Lawmakers added protections for sexual orientation and gender identity to the law in 2007, when Democrats were in control of the state legislature and the governor’s office. 

House File 583 would additionally require birth certificates in Iowa to reflect the biological reality of a person’s sex at birth and would redefine “sex” to mean “the state of being either male or female as observed or clinically verified at birth.”

Katherine Hamilton is a political reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on X @thekat_hamilton.