JK Rowling reported to police for ‘misgendering’ trans TV newsreader

Britain’s first transgender newsreader India Willoughby claims comments the Harry Potter author made about her are a hate crime and grotesque transphobia.

JK Rowling has committed a ‘cut-and-dry offence’ according to India Willoughby. Picture: AFP

JK Rowling has been reported to police by the broadcaster India Willoughby over claims of transphobia.

Willoughby, a co-host of Loose Women, reported Rowling to police for a series of online posts on Twitter/X.

In one, the Harry Potter author, 58, called Willoughby, also 58, a man.

In an interview with Byline TV, Willoughby, who is Britain’s first transgender newsreader, claimed Rowling had “definitely committed a crime” and that it was a “cut-and-dry offence”.

Rowling said no law compelled her to refer to Willoughby as female.

JK Rowling has not ‘waded in to the trans debate.’ She has deliberately insulted me - a woman - by calling me a man. Who I am is not a debate. It’s a material, provable fact. She is refusing to recognise trans people’s identity. pic.twitter.com/IVf6qvqekJ

— India Willoughby (@IndiaWilloughby) March 5, 2024

After a post last week by Rowling led to a discussion of all-female changing rooms, one Twitter/X user posted a video of Willoughby to illustrate a point. Rowling responded: “There isn’t a lady in this [video], just a man revelling in his misogynistic performance of what he thinks ‘woman’ means: narcissistic, shallow and exhibitionist.”

In the interview, Willoughby said: “JK Rowling has definitely committed a crime. I’m legally a woman, she knows I’m a woman, and she calls me a man. That is a breach of both the Equalities Act and the Gender Recognition Act. She’s tweeted that out to 14 million followers.

“If you check out the accounts that have been responding to me on the back of that, her trigger, it’s absolutely disgusting. Putrid.”

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Responding to the interview, Rowling said gender-critical views are protected in law and suggested she could make a counterclaim for defamation.

She wrote: “Some time ago, lawyers advised me that not only did I have a clearly winnable case against India Willoughby for defamation, but that India’s obsessive targeting of me over the past few years may meet the legal threshold for harassment.”

A Northumbria police spokesman said: “We are currently awaiting to speak to the complainant further.”

The Times