Lawmakers in the U.S. Midwest on Thursday weighed a proposal to limit transgender students’ right to play school sports, a measure legal experts say would be as incendiary as a bathroom ban approved three years ago in the state of North Carolina.

The proposal in South Dakota that would only allow transgender student athletes to compete according to the gender on their birth certificates was argued before state lawmakers on Thursday in the capital city of Pierre.

The measure is reminiscent of a controversial law passed in North Carolina three years ago that restricted public bathroom access to transgender students according to the sex on their birth certificate rather than their gender identity.

The law was repealed after boycotts by sports organizations, companies and entertainers cost North Carolina hundreds of millions of dollars worth of business.

“South Dakota is on the cusp of becoming the first state since North Carolina to pass an explicit attempt to restrict and alienate transgender people,” said the National Center for Transgender Equality in a statement released on Thursday. Read more via Reuters