RALEIGH, N.C. (BP) — North Carolina is the 22nd state to ban medical gender transitions among minors, although similar laws have been either struck down or face court challenges in other states.
The North Carolina General Assembly on Aug. 16 overrode Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto of House Bill 808 among three veto overrides of bills impacting transgender youth.
Gender transition medical procedures, puberty-blocking drugs and hormone treatments for those under the age of 18 are now illegal in the state, and medical professionals violating the law would face revocations of their medical license.
A federal judge struck down a similar law in Arkansas, and courts have blocked the enforcement of such laws in Alabama, Florida, Indiana and Kentucky, according to the Human Rights Campaign’s tracking site.
In addition to the states named above, similar laws banning such procedures have been passed in Arizona, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and West Virginia.
Most of the laws are facing court battles, Politico reported.
The Family Policy Alliance, which has worked to promote similar bills nationally, praised the North Carolina laws and others across the nation.
“The men and women who have courageously supported this legislation are heroes,” Autumn Leva, Family Policy Alliance senior vice president of strategy, said in a press release. “We know that 50 years from now, our nation will look back and see transitioning children as one of the great medical scandals of our age. We are honored to be among those speaking out against injustice, and we greatly commend those who have risked their careers and even their personal safety to do the same.”
Under the North Carolina law, minors who undergo such procedures could sue their doctor and their doctor’s staff up to 25 years after treatment. The law allows exceptions for patients with certain biological gender abnormalities, and grandfathers in “medically necessary” procedures approved by parents and doctors that began before Aug. 1.
North Carolina legislators also overrode Cooper’s vetoes of two additional bills impacting transgender youth there. With the additional vetoes:
- Instruction about gender identity and sexuality is forbidden in kindergarten through fourth grade, and teachers must inform parents before calling the parents’ children by different names or pronouns.
- Biological males are banned from girls’ sports teams in middle school through college.
Messengers to the 2023 Southern Baptist Convention Annual Meeting passed a resolution opposing “gender-affirming care” and all forms of “gender transition” interventions.
Messengers commended states that have passed laws to protect children from gender transition procedures and called on other states to “reverse any law or policy that supports ‘gender transition’ interventions, undermines parental rights, or creates supposed sanctuary jurisdictions that facilitate these harmful interventions for minors.”
The Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC) has advocated to protect children from gender transitions, and upholds the “fundamental rights of parents” in making such decisions for their children at the state and national levels.
“Our culture has radically turned away from the foundational biblical views of gender and sexuality, and the repercussions are devastating,” Hannah Daniel, ERLC’s policy manager, told Baptist Press in July. “Children should never be subjected to social experimentation, and leaders from across the partisan spectrum should join together to protect the most vulnerable among us.”
(EDITOR’S NOTE – Diana Chandler is Baptist Press’ senior writer.)
