The Republican-led Senate is poised to vote on multiple bills that would impose greater restrictions on gender transition procedures in Arizona.
The Senate Health and Human Services Committee passed four bills targeting different aspects of gender transition procedures: Senate Bills 1014, 1177, 1094, and 1095. All with the exception of SB 1095 were heard in committee last week. All were passed without the support of Democratic lawmakers.
Progressive activists lined up to testify against the bills during the several committee hearings.
SB1095, which would ban gender transition procedures for minors, provoked testimony from several activist adults who identify as transgender.
Former Liberty Elementary School District governing board member, Paul Bixler, said SB1095 would harm, not help, children. Bixler, a man, identifies as a transgender woman.
Ruth Carter, an attorney, said SB1095 amounted to discrimination. Carter, a woman, identifies as a nonbinary individual.
Marilyn Rodriguez, Creosote Partners founder and lobbyist representing the ACLU, said SB1095 was impermissibly broad as written.
Sen. Lauren Kuby (D-LD8) called the bill discriminatory, and argued that lawmakers shouldn’t ban gender transition procedures since certain healthcare experts support those procedures as treatments for gender dysphoria.
“These are private, personal decisions, healthcare decisions, we shouldn’t be discriminating against transgendered youth or those who have gender dysphoria as is described,” said Kuby.
Sen. Analise Ortiz (D-LD24) said the legislature would be better focusing on making healthcare more affordable. Ortiz said the legislation was not only discriminatory but violative of parental rights laws.
“It bans healthcare for a specific group of people solely based on gender identity; that is discrimination no matter how you want to paint it,” said Ortiz.
Sen. Mark Finchem (R-LD1), the bill sponsor, disputed the narratives of his Democratic colleagues that healthcare experts were to be trusted fully and that gender transition procedures were appropriate for minors.
“To those who worship the grounds that doctors walk on: they also said cigarettes were good for you,” said Finchem. “[Permanently altering treatments like mastectomies] are decisions that kids are being talked into, in some cases. I didn’t just dream this bill up myself. This came from kids and parents. More kids than parents.”
Majority Leader John Kavanagh (R-LD3) questioned the logic of his Democratic colleagues that parents had a right to submit children to irreversible medical treatments, but not the right to decide whether their children should be called by certain pronouns or alternative names in school.
SB 1014 would require health insurers to offer coverage for detransition procedures should those insurers provide coverage for gender transition procedures. It would also issue reporting requirements on insurance claims for gender detransitions.
“Detransitioners are people too; they deserve the same care as those who are manipulated into believing they have gender dysphoria, which leads them to undergo gender transition surgery that they later regret,” said the bill sponsor, Sen. Janae Shamp (R-LD29), in a press release. “This legislative package puts their long-term well-being above politics and ideology.”
Jeanne Woodbury, a lobbyist for the ACLU, argued the reporting requirements within the bill would result in discriminatory outcomes.
Bixler, the transgender-identifying former school board member, claimed the bill would result in providers refusing to provide gender transition procedures.
SB 1177 would ban public funding for gender transition procedures.
Sen. Wendy Rogers (R-LD7), the bill sponsor, explained during Wednesday’s HHS hearing that she discovered taxpayers were funding gender transition treatments for prisoners. Rogers also discovered that individuals were being arrested on purpose in order to receive free gender transition treatments.
“Taxpayer dollars should never be used to bankroll irreversible procedures on children,” said Rogers in a later press release. “This legislation draws a hard line and makes clear that public funds will not subsidize experimental or life-altering interventions on minors.”
Ashton Allen expressed support on behalf of Center for Arizona Policy. Allen said subsidies should be tied to valid medical treatments, which he said gender transition procedures weren’t.
Woodbury, the transgender-identifying ACLU lobbyist, argued against Rogers’ claims and said the treatments were affordable. Woodbury also said an end to subsidization would lead to excessive medical risks associated with forced detransitions.
Minority Whip Rosanna Gabaldon (D-LD21) said ending subsidies was “extreme and punitive,” as well as “unfair and dangerous.”
Sen. Sally Ann Gonzales (D-LD20) accused Rogers of faking a story that individuals were getting themselves arrested in order to receive free gender transition treatments. Gonzales called the bill discriminatory.
Sen. Shamp questioned why drugs historically considered to be dangerous were suddenly ethical in the context of gender reassignment.
“Lupron was deemed cruel and unusual punishment being utilized in the prison system for sex offenders, rapists. But now we want Arizona taxpayers to pay for that drug to be utilized for gender reassignment? How the heck did we get here?” said Shamp.
SB 1094 would allow individuals to seek damages in court against physicians who performed gender reassignment surgeries on them as minors. Kavanagh sponsored the bill.
“When permanent procedures are performed on minors who suffer harm, there must be consequences,” said Kavanagh in a press release. “These reforms restore transparency and provide a pathway to just compensation for those harmed.”
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The federal government will no longer subsidize transgender procedures for either adults or children.
On Thursday, Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. issued a declaration prohibiting gender transition procedures as valid treatments for addressing gender dysphoria.
“Sex-rejecting procedures for children and adolescents are neither safe nor effective as a treatment modality for gender dysphoria, gender incongruence, or other related disorders in minors, and therefore, fail to meet professional recognized standards of health care. For the purposes of this declaration, ‘sex-rejecting procedures’ means pharmaceutical or surgical interventions, including puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries such as mastectomies, vaginoplasties, and other procedures, that attempt to align an individual’s physical appearance or body with an asserted identity that differs from the individual’s sex.”
The declaration cited the HHS evidence review on pediatric gender dysphoria care published in May as justification for the cessation of funds. As part of this evidence review, HHS invited peer reviews from other major medical associations. Among those invited, the American Academy of Pediatrics and Endocrine Society declined to participate. However, the American Psychiatric Association and eight other peer reviewers submitted their own reviews, which HHS published along with their own responses last month.
Further justification for the declaration came from evidence reviews and consensus by other European nations: the United Kingdom, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Italy, Brazil, and Australia.
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) will also be proposing new rules barring hospitals which participate in Medicare and Medicaid from performing gender transition procedures, and prohibiting Medicaid from paying for those procedures.
The FDA issued warnings to around a dozen manufacturers of breast binders to cease marketing to children for gender dysphoria. Noncompliance would result in enforcement actions, including product seizures.
HHS will also be reversing the Biden administration’s efforts to make gender dysphoria a protected class within the federal definition of “disability.”
In a press conference on the declaration, Kennedy said medical professionals supportive of transgenderism had “betrayed” their oath and “moral obligation” to do no harm.
“This is not medicine, it is malpractice. We’re done with junk science driven by ideological pursuits, not the well-being of children,” said Kennedy. “Sex-rejecting procedures rob children of their futures.”
One report cited by HHS estimated that 2023 revenue for gender-transitioning drugs and surgeries exceeded $4.4 billion, a figure which is on track to exceed $7 billion by 2030.
CMS Administrator Mehmet Oz said children were sold a “dishonest narrative” about gender transitions as healthcare.
“You know what you get when you mix politics and medicine? Politics. There is no medicine left,” said Oz.
53 percent of children are in Medicaid or CHIP programs.
Oz offered a non-comprehensive list of recurring health problems within gender transition patients: puberty blockers associated with reduced bone density, altered brain development, lifelong disrupted sexual dysfunction; cross-sex hormones associated with infertility, loss of sexual function, cardiovascular issues, and long-term endocrine problems; and gender transition surgeries associated with disfiguration, pain, and mental health troubles.
Oz pointed out the high costs of the gender transition surgeries, offering examples of a vaginoplasty ($60,000) and phalloplasty ($150,000).
HHS estimates these bans will result in $250 million in savings for the taxpayer.
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Earlier this month, the Arizona Senate advanced legislation that would impose “civil liability on health care professionals or physicians relating to gender transition or detransition procedures provided to minors.”
The bill, SB 1586, which was introduced by Arizona Senate Majority Leader Janae Shamp, (R-LD-29) would bring about legal protections for children and teens who have been subjected to so-called ‘gender transition procedures’ and suffered serious consequences of the alleged ‘treatment’ later in life. It would also set grounds for medical malpractice lawsuits to follow.
SB 1586 was passed in the Senate on in early March along party lines. It was given its first and second reading in the House of Representatives on the 12th and 13th.
In a statement following the bill’s Senate passage, Sen. Shamp said, “We have heard many tragic stories about young boys and girls who have submitted to life-altering procedures to change their gender – only to experience severe repercussions later on when they mature.”
She continued, “While Arizona law is clear against these types of procedures, there is more we as lawmakers can do to deter physicians and providers from entertaining any of the illegal and immoral operations that are ravaging our young people. Republicans again have shown their willingness to do what is necessary to stop the harmful mutilation of our children’s bodies, and we will continue to fight on behalf of our precious sons and daughters until these inhumane and ungodly practices are abolished. If there is nothing wrong with these procedures, then this policy won’t apply.”
Shamp also highlighted the bill in a recent release with a vow to implement a “Make Arizona Healthy Again” agenda.
Sharing AZ Senate Republicans video of the bill’s passage, Shamp simply stated “Do no harm!,” citing the Hippocratic Oath taken by all doctors.
If enacted, the bill would set “the grounds for which a medical malpractice action may be brought forward,” adding that, “a health care professional or physician who provides or provided a minor with a gender transition procedure is strictly and personally liable for all costs associated with subsequent detransition procedures sought by the minor within 25 years after the commencement of a gender transition procedure.”
The bill would also allow victims and their families to bring a civil action lawsuit for, “a) declaratory or injunctive relief; b) compensatory damages, including pain and suffering, loss of reputation, loss of income and loss of consortium, including the loss of the expectation of sharing parenthood; c) punitive damages; d) attorney fees and costs; and e) any other appropriate relief.”
A Senate bill to prohibit health care professionals from providing or referring gender transition procedures to children, the Arizona’s Children Deserve Help Not Harm Act, inspired a wide variety of testimony during Wednesday’s meeting of the Senate Health and Human Services Committee, though it ultimately failed to pass. State Senator Tyler Pace (R-Mesa) voted with committee Democrats to kill the bill. Pace argued that parents should have the right to make these kinds of medical decisions for their children.
The bill, introduced by State Senator Warren Petersen (R-Gilbert), would’ve included children born with medically verifiable sex development disorders such as ambiguous external biological sex characteristics, abnormal sex chromosome structure, or abnormal sex steroid hormone production or action; children seeking treatment for infection, injury, disease, or disorders caused or exacerbated by a gender transition procedure; and children requiring procedures due to physical disorder, injury, or illness that would place them in imminent danger of death or bodily function impairment unless surgery is performed.
One of the main opponents of the bill that Pace sided with when gave his “no” vote was Gilbert resident Andi Young, who identified herself as the parent of a transgender child and budding licensed mental health professional for children. She neglected to mention that she’s been the co-chair for the Phoenix chapter of the Gay Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) for over a year now, the local plant of a national organization pushing LGBTQ ideologies and activism onto children. Young began working with GLSEN Phoenix as their community editor in May 2019 according to her LinkedIn, carrying out responsibilities such as pushing LGBTQ content in schools through educators, and lobbying for LGBTQ legislation at the Arizona State Capitol. Our reporters checked with the secretary of state’s office: although Young claims to be a lobbyist, she wasn’t registered as of press time. Young also didn’t identify herself as a lobbyist or as a member of GLSEN Phoenix on the bill’s page documenting community supporters and opponents.
AZ Free News reported last December that GLSEN Phoenix was advising educators to incorporate “secret libraries” in their classrooms to smuggle in LGBTQ and social justice curriculum. GLSEN is also behind the Gender and Sexualities Alliance (GSA) clubs popping up throughout K-12 schools; some schools call their GSA by other names, like “Student Alliance For Equality,” or “SAFE” clubs.
During her testimony to the senate committee, Young explained that she encouraged her daughter to transition after her daughter began to be withdrawn, depressed, and socially isolated around puberty and that no amount of therapy, support groups, or psychiatric medications helped. Based on the timeline of Young’s GLSEN involvement, it is unclear the extent of influence GLSEN and Young’s work had on her daughter.
Young asserted to the committee that a doctor who specialized in transgender youth told Young that they should give their daughter “gender-affirming medical treatment.” Young testified that her daughter’s mental condition improved over the last five months due to “gender-affirming medications.”
“I am terrified of what will happen to my child if they are denied this care that is so critical to their well-being,” said Young. “My child was assigned female at birth but they identify as trans-masculine but nonbinary. Gender is a spectrum, it’s not a one or the other. They’re on the male-leaning side of the gender spectrum.”
On the other side of the argument against the bill stood a transgender adult, who argued that children lacked the capacity to make these life-altering medical decisions. That transgender woman, Jadis Argiope, expressed gratitude that he was able to transition when he was an adult.
“We’re talking about the disturbing practice of putting kids through cross-sex hormones, puberty blockers, irreversible surgeries, all before they can even drink, vote, or get a credit card,” said Argiope. “And now, we know we can’t trust their judgment or self-perception because that used to be us. Yet when it comes to gender identity, we’re told to trust them unwaveringly. I urge you all: let’s be responsible and give these kids the time to grow up the best way they can for themselves and not stand by as psychotic doctors stand by and salivate over these kids and misguided suckers of parents/legal guardians who would sign away their rights.”
Argiope shared that he had removed his own testicles due to his gender dysphoria, a decision that made headlines nearly a decade ago. He argued that his condition has to do with body dysmorphia, and that intervening too early in a child’s life with affirmation and validation of their feelings would only harm them. Argiope said that it was unfashionable to give pushback to these kids, especially in the LGBTQ communities, but that it would be necessary.
“I had the agency as an adult to make this decision. As a child I wouldn’t have,” said Argiope. “Honestly a lot of this is about body dysmorphia. And I realize there’s a disconnect. There’s a huge disconnect between the brain and the body, and there could be many reasons for this. And not all dysphoria is because youre transgender. Like I said most kids who experience dysmorphia, 85 percent of those kids outgrow it and grow to be healthy, happy gay lesbians and adults.”
Statute determines that SB1138 would’ve applied to podiatrists, chiropractors, dentists, medical physicians and surgeons, naturopathic physicians, nurses, dispensing opticians, optometrists, osteopathic physicians and surgeons, pharmacists, physical therapists, psychologists, veterinarians, physician assistants, radiologic technologists, homeopathic physicians, behavioral health professionals, occupational therapists, respiratory therapists, acupuncturists, athletic trainers, massage therapists, nursing care institution administrators, assisted living facilities managers, midwifes, and audiologists and speech pathologists.
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
