As the gender ideology assault on America’s children continues, state legislators are pushing back with legislation to protect minors from harmful puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and mutilating surgeries.
Approximately 100 bills have been proposed in 27 states aimed at protecting children from accessing hormone blocking drugs, surgeries and other types of “gender-affirming care.” Other draft laws being debated in state legislatures entail pronoun use in schools and biological boys in girls’ sports teams and bathrooms.
Yesterday, Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves signed into law HB 1125, known as the “Regulate Experimental Adolescent Procedures Act,” which prohibits puberty blockers and any “gender transition” medical procedures on minors.
On February 13, South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem signed a bill into law HB 1080, also known as the “Help Not Harm” bill, after the state legislature overwhelmingly passed it 30-4. According to the new law, a doctor may not purpose surgery to attempt to alter a minor’s biological sex. In addition, punishments for doctors who violate the law includes revoking their medical license and exposing them to civil litigation.
Other states such as Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Tennessee, Texas, and Utah have also already enacted legislation to protect children from these procedures.
In the Sunshine State, the Florida Board of Medicine and the Florida Board of Osteopathic Medicine approved a rule last October that would prohibit minors from receiving puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and mutilating surgery to remove healthy male or female organs. On November 4, the Boards passed and updated their “Standards of Practice for the Treatment of Gender Dysphoria in Minors,” the medical standards practice in Florida that prohibits medical professionals from beginning procedures for gender dysphoria in children under 18 years of age. Last month, the Florida Boards revised the language and removed an exception that allowed children in clinical trials and studies at state universities to participate in chemical and genital mutilation.
This week the Florida House of Representatives filed HB 1223, a bill that would mandate that “a person’s sex is an immutable biological trait” and “it is false to ascribe to a person a pronoun that does not correspond to such person’s sex.”
The bill also includes proposed changes to the Parental Rights in Education law introduced last year by Gov. Ron DeSantis that restricts lessons and discussions regarding gender identity and sexuality through eighth grade.
Last week, Kansas became the first state to pass a bill that defines a “woman” as someone who is biologically born female in order to protect and preserve women’s rights and privacy in public restrooms, school sports, prisons and shelters. Senators voted 26-10 to approve the “Women’s Bill of Rights” which defines a female as someone “whose biological reproductive system is developed to produce ova” while a male refers to anyone whose reproductive system “is developed to fertilize the ova of a female.”
Most American voters also support the legislation against the LGBT agenda.
A recent Rasmussen Reports survey of 900 likely U.S. voters found 58 percent of respondents at least somewhat approve of “legislation making it illegal to perform sex-change surgery on minors,” with 48 percent stating they “strongly approve” of the legislative proposals.
Although slightly fewer surveyed support laws prohibiting “hormone replacement therapy” for minors, still a slight majority (53 percent) are at least somewhat supportive of blocking children from receiving such treatments. Sixty-three percent of Republicans and 41 percent of Democrats support blocking minors’ access to hormone therapies.
In addition, a recent YouGov survey of 1,000 adults across the nation found that Americans were largely against so-called “gender-affirming” procedures for children.
Liberty Counsel represents licensed counselors who provide life-saving counseling to minors who desperately desire to conform their attractions, behaviors, and gender identities to their sincerely held religious beliefs. Liberty Counsel recently won two cases at the federal court of appeals striking down counseling bans in Florida, Georgia and Alabama under the First Amendment.
Liberty Counsel Founder and Chairman Mat Staver said, “The assault on our children to push them into these harmful drugs and mutilating procedures without fully comprehending the consequences is appalling. We commend these legislators who are working to protect minors from irreversible and unnecessary medications and mutilating surgeries.”
