Texas officials started investigating parents of transgender minors for possible child abuse, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday.
The New York Times reported that the investigations were started by the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services following an order from GOP Gov. Greg Abbott. The Times added that the order followed a “non binding” opinion by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton that said parents who provide their minor children with puberty-suppressing drugs or other gender-affirming treatments could be investigated for child abuse.
“Among the first to be investigated was an employee of the state protective services agency who has a 16-year-old transgender child,” the report stated. The ACLU of Texas went to court to attempt to stop the inquiry.
“The employee, who was not named in the court filing, works on the review of reports of abuse and neglect. She was placed on administrative leave last week, according to the filing, and on Friday was visited by an investigator from the agency, which is also seeking medical records related to her child. The family of the child, identified in court documents only as Mary Doe, has refused to voluntarily turn over the records,” the Times stated.
The employee wrote in a declaration filed with that suit that she is “terrified for Mary’s health and well-being” and that she feels “betrayed by my state and the agency for whom I work.”
The employee, “Jane Doe” and her husband “John Doe” added that “not providing Mary with the medically necessary health care that she needs is not an option for us.”
The Times reported that the state’s investigator told the parents that the only allegation against them was that their child, who was transitioning from male to female, “might have been provided with gender-affirming health care.”
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“Gender-affirming care promotes the health and well being of transgender youth and is provided by medical and mental health professionals, based on well established scientific research,” the lawsuit claims. “Parents and families across the state of Texas are fearful that if they follow the recommendations of their medical providers to treat their adolescent children’s suffering from gender dysphoria, they could face investigation, criminal prosecution and the removal of their children from their custody.”
In President Biden’s State of the Union address Tuesday, he promised “younger transgender Americans” that he “will always have your back as president.” This came after the Georgia Senate passed a bill that would prohibit student athletes from competing on sports teams that do not align with their biological sex, which Landon reported.
The bill, known as the “Save Girls’ Sports Act,” was created in an effort to preserve the “fairness of sports.” In recent months, William “Lia” Thomas, who is a biological male competing on the University of Pennsylviania’s women’s swim team, broke multiple women’s records. Thomas competed on the men’s swim team at UPenn for three years prior to competing on the women’s team.
"Forcing girls to play against biological boys inhibits the ability of young girls to win competitions, achieve scholarships and achieve the highest level of success," Georgia state Sen. Marty Harbin (R-Tyrone) said on the Senate floor Thursday.
One of Harbin’s Democratic colleagues, state Sen. Sally Harrell (D-Atlanta), who is the mother of a transgender child, said the bill is “hurting our kids.”
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