A Virginia Republican is taking Congress into the middle of an increasingly heated battle over the future of one of America’s oldest patriotic organizations.
Rep. Ben Cline (R-Va.) introduced the Daughters of the American Revolution Membership Integrity Act on Wednesday, legislation that would amend the organization’s congressional charter to explicitly limit membership to biological women following the group’s recent vote to reject a proposal that would have barred transgender applicants.
The bill comes just weeks after delegates at the Daughters of the American Revolution’s Continental Congress voted 1,481-984 against a measure that would have required members to be “born female,” preserving the organization’s current policy.
“The DAR has a longstanding tradition of celebrating and empowering women who represent the exceptional heritage of the birth of our Nation,” Cline said in a statement provided to Fox News Digital.
“However, as we celebrate America’s 250th birthday, the organization has now abandoned the very principles on which it was founded,” he continued. “Rather than honoring and preserving a lineage-based organization for women, it has embraced radical gender ideology at the expense of the women it was created to serve.”
Cline argued that his legislation would restore the organization’s original purpose.
“The Daughters of the American Revolution Membership Integrity Act is common-sense legislation that requires the Congressionally-charted DAR to return to serving the true daughters of the American Revolution,” he said.
Under the legislation, the organization’s federal charter would be updated to specify that membership is limited to biological females while leaving its longstanding genealogical requirements intact. The bill defines a female as an individual who “naturally has, had, will have, or would have but for a congenital anomaly or intentional or unintentional disruption, the reproductive system that produces, transports, and utilizes the large gamete (ova) for fertilization.”
Founded in 1890, the Daughters of the American Revolution was created after women were excluded from joining the Sons of the American Revolution. Today, the organization has roughly 190,000 members and requires applicants to prove direct bloodline descent from a patriot who aided the American Revolution while promoting historic preservation, education and patriotism.
The membership debate has been simmering for years.
In 2023, the DAR updated its nondiscrimination language, prompting criticism from members who argued the change effectively opened the door to transgender applicants. Organization leaders maintained that transgender women had already been eligible under longstanding policy, explaining that applicants with government-issued birth certificates identifying them as female could qualify for membership.
The issue returned to the spotlight last month when delegates rejected an effort to formally define membership as limited to those “born female,” touching off a fresh wave of criticism from members who argue the organization is drifting away from its founding mission.
Cline’s office said the legislation has already earned backing from several conservative organizations, including Concerned Women for America, the American Principles Project, Independent Women Forum and The Heritage Foundation.
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