Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC) on Monday took to the House floor to share his definition of a woman, criticizing Democrats for declaring “war on biology” by backing the rights of transgender people.
Cawthorn, who has been under scrutiny in the last week for comments in which he suggested he’d seen other lawmakers do cocaine and invite him to take part in orgies, said Democrats had “exchanged natural science for a party platform and declared war on biology.”
He added that “your left-wing movement is forcing children to endure radical expressions of sexuality. And yet, you can’t even define what a woman is. You might amend the bill, but you’ll never amend biology.”
The floor comments follow “Saturday Night Live” featuring a skit this week poking fun at Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) for asking Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson to define a woman.
When Blackburn asked Jackson to define the word woman, the judge responded, “I can’t.”
Republicans have also called for transgender women to be banned from competing in women’s sports, with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) refusing to acknowledge the historic win of Lia Thomas, a transgender swimmer for the University of Pennsylvania, at the NCAA women’s swimming and diving championships in March.
Cawthorn, who is 26 and in his first term, said: “I never imagined that one of my sacred duties in this hallowed chamber would be explaining to the House Speaker the difference between a man and a woman.”
“Take notes, Madame Speaker, I’m about to define what a woman is for you.”
Cawthorn further went on to define a woman as having “XX chromosomes, no tallywhacker.”