Latest news with #EqualityFlorida
Los Angeles Times
10 hours ago
- Politics
- Los Angeles Times
Families of trans kids worry about what's next after Supreme Court rules on gender-affirming care
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — A U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding Tennessee's ban on gender-affirming care for minors is leaving transgender children and their parents uncertain and anxious about the future. The court on Wednesday handed President Trump's administration and Republican-led states a significant victory by effectively protecting them from at least some of the legal challenges against many efforts to repeal safeguards for transgender people. The case stems from a Tennessee law banning puberty blockers and hormone treatments for transgender minors. Opponents of gender-affirming care say people who transition when they're young could later regret it. Families of transgender children argue the ban amounts to unlawful sex discrimination and violates the constitutional rights of vulnerable Americans. Eli Givens, who is transgender and testified against Tennessee's gender-affirming care bill in 2023, said it's devastating that lawmakers 'who have called us degenerates, have told us that we're living in fiction' are celebrating the court's ruling. The nonbinary college student from Spring Hill received mastectomy surgery in 2022 at age 17. They said the legislation inspired their advocacy, and they attended the Supreme Court arguments in the case last December, on their 20th birthday. 'We're not making a world that trans youth are welcomed or allowed to be a part of,' Givens said. 'And so, it's just a really scary kind of future we might have.' Jennifer Solomon, who supports parents and families at the LGBTQ+ rights group Equality Florida, called the ruling a decision 'that one day will embarrass the courts.' 'This is a decision that every parent should be concerned about,' she said. 'When politicians are able to make a decision that overrides your ability to medically make decisions for your children, every family should worry.' Chloe Cole, a conservative activist known for speaking about her gender-transition reversal, posted on social media after the court's decision that 'every child in America is now safer.' Cole was cited as an example by Tennessee Republicans as one of the reasons the law was needed. Matt Walsh, an activist who was one of the early backers of Tennessee's law, applauded the high court. Three years ago, Walsh shared videos on social media of a doctor saying gender-affirming procedures are 'huge moneymakers' for hospitals and a staffer saying anyone with a religious objection should quit. 'This is a truly historic victory and I'm grateful to be a part of it, along with so many others who have fought relentlessly for years,' Walsh posted on social media. Rosie Emrich is worried the court decision will embolden legislators in New Hampshire, where legislation banning hormone treatments and puberty blockers for children is expected to reach the governor's desk. Lawmakers are weighing whether to block the treatments from minors already receiving them, like Emrich's 9-year-old child. 'It's definitely disappointing, and I'm trying to figure out how I'm going to talk to my kid about it,' Emrich said. Emrich said she and her husband have considered moving from New Hampshire and are waiting to see what will happen. 'The hard part is, like, I've grown up here, my husband has grown up here, we very much want to raise our family here,' she said. 'And we don't want to leave if we don t have to.' Erica Barker and her family moved from Jackson, Mississippi, to North Las Vegas, Nevada, a little over two years ago so one of her children could start receiving gender-affirming care. Barker's transgender daughter, then 12, had been in therapy for three years, and the family agreed it was time for medical treatments. Mississippi passed a ban on gender-affirming care for minors the next year, which Barker said she saw coming. Barker said the move was complicated, involving a new job for her husband and two mortgages when their Mississippi home was slow to sell, but it also brought access to care for her daughter, now 14. 'Our hearts are hurting for folks who are not having the same experience,' Barker said. In another state with a ban on gender-affirming care for minors, Oklahoma resident Erika Dubose said finding care for her 17-year-old nonbinary child, Sydney Gebhardt, involves a four-hour drive to Kansas and getting prescriptions filled in Oregon and mailed to their home. 'I just wish the younger folks wouldn't have to go through this,' Gebhardt said. 'These folks deserve to be focusing on their academics and hanging out with their friends and making memories with their families and planning out a safe and happy future.' Sarah Moskanos, who lives near Milwaukee, said her 14-year-old transgender daughter went through nearly a decade of counseling before she started medical gender-affirming care but has been sure since the age of 4 that she identified as a girl. 'I would say that there is decades of research on this very thing,' she said. 'And we know what works and we know what will save trans kids' lives is gender-affirming care.' Wisconsin doesn't have a gender-affirming care ban, but Moskanos said getting her daughter that care has not been easy. She now worries about what the future holds. 'We are but one election cycle away from disaster for my kid,' she said. Mo Jenkins, a 26-year-old transgender Texas native and legislative staffer at the state Capitol, said she began taking hormone therapy at 16 years old and has been on and off treatment since then. 'My transition was out of survival,' Jenkins said. Texas outlawed gender-affirming care for minors two years ago, and in May, the Legislature passed a bill tightly defining a man and a woman by their sex characteristics. 'I'm not surprised at the ruling. I am disheartened,' Jenkins said. 'Trans people are not going to disappear.' Mattise, Mulvihill and Seewer write for the Associated Press. Mulvihill reported from Cherry Hill, N.J., and Seewer reported from Toledo, Ohio. AP journalists Susan Haigh in Hartford, Conn.; Kenya Hunter in Atlanta; Laura Bargfeld in Chicago; Nadia Lathan in Austin, Texas; and Daniel Kozin in Pinecrest, Fla., contributed to this report.
2 days ago
- Politics
Families of trans kids worry about what's next after Supreme Court rules on gender-affirming care
NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- A U.S. Supreme Court decision Wednesday upholding Tennessee's ban on gender-affirming care for minors is leaving transgender children and their parents uncertain and anxious about the future. The court handed President Donald Trump's administration and Republican-led states a significant victory by effectively protecting them from at least some of the legal challenges against many efforts to repeal safeguards for transgender people. The case stems from a Tennessee law banning puberty blockers and hormone treatments for transgender minors. Opponents of gender-affirming care say people who transition when they're young could later regret it. Families of transgender children argue the ban amounts to unlawful sex discrimination and violates the constitutional rights of vulnerable Americans. Eli Givens, who is transgender and testified against Tennessee's gender-affirming care bill in 2023, said it's devastating that lawmakers 'who have called us degenerates, have told us that we're living in fiction' are celebrating the court's ruling. The nonbinary college student from Spring Hill received mastectomy surgery in 2022 at age 17. They said the legislation inspired their advocacy, and they attended the Supreme Court arguments in the case last December, on their 20th birthday. 'We're not making a world that trans youth are welcomed or allowed to be a part of,' Givens said. 'And so, it's just a really scary kind of future we might have.' Jennifer Solomon, who supports parents and families at the LGBTQ+ rights group Equality Florida, called the ruling a decision 'that one day will embarrass the courts.' 'This is a decision that every parent should be concerned about,' she said. 'When politicians are able to make a decision that overrides your ability to medically make decisions for your children, every family should worry.' Chloe Cole, a conservative activist known for speaking about her gender-transition reversal, posted on social media after the court's decision that 'every child in America is now safer.' Cole was cited as an example by Tennessee Republicans as one of the reasons the law was needed. Matt Walsh, an activist who was one of the early backers of Tennessee's law, applauded the high court. Three years ago, Walsh shared videos on social media of a doctor saying gender-affirming procedures are 'huge moneymakers' for hospitals and a staffer saying anyone with a religious objection should quit. 'This is a truly historic victory and I'm grateful to be a part of it, along with so many others who have fought relentlessly for years,' Walsh posted on social media. Rosie Emrich is worried the court decision will embolden legislators in New Hampshire, where legislation banning hormone treatments and puberty blockers for children is expected to reach the governor's desk. Lawmakers are weighing whether to block the treatments from minors already receiving them, like Emrich's 9-year-old child. 'It's definitely disappointing, and I'm trying to figure out how I'm going to talk to my kid about it,' Emrich said. Emrich said she and her husband have considered moving from New Hampshire and are waiting to see what will happen. 'The hard part is, like, I've grown up here, my husband has grown up here, we very much want to raise our family here,' she said. 'And we don't want to leave if we don t have to.' Erica Barker and her family moved from Jackson, Mississippi, to North Las Vegas, Nevada, a little over two years ago so one of her children could start receiving gender-affirming care. Barker's transgender daughter, then 12, had been in therapy for three years, and the family agreed it was time for medical treatments. Mississippi passed a ban on gender-affirming care for minors the next year, which Barker said she saw coming. Barker said the move was complicated, involving a new job for her husband and two mortgages when their Mississippi home was slow to sell, but it also brought access to care for her daughter, now 14. 'Our hearts are hurting for folks who are not having the same experience,' Barker said. In another state with a ban on gender-affirming care for minors, Oklahoma resident Erika Dubose said finding care for her 17-year-old nonbinary child, Sydney Gebhardt, involves a four-hour drive to Kansas and getting prescriptions filled in Oregon and mailed to their home. 'I just wish the younger folks wouldn't have to go through this,' Gebhardt said. 'These folks deserve to be focusing on their academics and hanging out with their friends and making memories with their families and planning out a safe and happy future.' Sarah Moskanos, who lives near Milwaukee, said her 14-year-old transgender daughter went through nearly a decade of counseling before she started medical gender-affirming care but has been sure since the age of 4 that she identified as a girl. 'I would say that there is decades of research on this very thing,' she said. 'And we know what works and we know what will save trans kids' lives is gender-affirming care.' Wisconsin doesn't have a gender-affirming care ban, but Moskanos said getting her daughter that care has not been easy. She now worries about what the future holds. 'We are but one election cycle away from disaster for my kid,' she said. Mo Jenkins, a 26-year-old transgender Texas native and legislative staffer at the state Capitol, said she began taking hormone therapy at 16 years old and has been on and off treatment since then. 'My transition was out of survival,' Jenkins said. Texas outlawed gender-affirming care for minors two years ago, and in May, the Legislature passed a bill tightly defining a man and a woman by their sex characteristics. 'I'm not surprised at the ruling. I am disheartened,' Jenkins said. 'Trans people are not going to disappear.' ___ Mulvihill reported from Cherry Hill, New Jersey, and Seewer reported from Toledo, Ohio. Associated Press journalists Susan Haigh in Hartford, Connecticut; Kenya Hunter in Atlanta; Laura Bargfeld in Chicago; Nadia Lathan in Austin, Texas; and Daniel Kozin in Pinecrest, Florida, contributed to this report.
Yahoo
08-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Advocates claim victory as several anti-LGBTQ bills fail this legislative session
LGBTQ advocates are claiming victory after this year's legislative session. 'We just achieved the impossible again: Every anti-LGBTQ bill filed this year has been defeated!' wrote Equality Florida in a press release. Bills that would have banned pride flags and regulated the use of pronouns in the workplace died in committee or never even had a hearing, the LGBTQ advocacy group said. Senate Democratic Leader Lori Berman attributed the failure of this year's anti-LGBTQ bills to the hundred of LGBTQ Floridians and their allies who showed up to the Capitol and met with lawmakers face to face. 'Florida lawmakers are increasingly turning away from the relentless anti-LGBTQ culture war attacks of recent years,' Berman told the USA TODAY Network – Florida. 'Those laws have done real harm to the LGBTQ community, especially transgender Floridians. But they're not helping anyone. And that's what Floridians want lawmakers to focus on – making their lives better.' In recent years, the Republican majority has pushed laws that have targeted LGBTQ Floridians. It kicked off in 2022, when the Florida Legislature passed HB 1557, which is known as the 'Don't Say Gay' bill by critics. The law, called the 'Parental Rights in Education Act,' prohibits the teaching of sexual orientation and gender identity in schools. Since then, Gov. Ron DeSantis and Republican leaders have expanded that law and passed more legislation, including laws that require people use the bathroom of their biological sex at birth and that driver's licenses display the biological sex at birth versus someone's gender identity. DeSantis has touted these laws as examples of how Florida is the state 'where woke goes to die.' But in 2025, the four bills advocates flagged as 'expressly anti-LGBTQ,' died at the previously scheduled end of the regular legislative session. (Lawmakers will return to Tallahassee May 12 but only to finish the state budget and related bills, including a tax cut package.) A bill that would have banned Pride flags flying on government buildings (SB 100) failed after the Senate bill's sponsor, Randy Fine, R-Melbourne, resigned to run for Congress, and no other senator picked up the measure. Another bill advocates dubbed the 'Don't Say Gay or Trans at Work' (SB 440) never moved past the committee phase in the Senate and was never heard in the House. If passed, it would have prohibited workplaces from requiring employees to use preferred pronouns. 'Official Actions of Local Governments' (SB 420) would have banned local municipalities from spending money or promoting diversity, equity and inclusion policies. While it got through a committee stop, lawmakers, including Senate Rules Committee chair Kathleen Passidomo, R-Naples, did voice concern about the language, worrying it was too broad. The bill was never heard in its second committee. And 'Official Actions of Local Governments' (SB 1710/HB 731) died in committee in both the Senate and the House. The measure would have prohibited spending on DEI initiatives and applying for federal health care grants that include DEI. 'This year the Legislature asserted more independence and spent less time on partisan issues,' said Jon Harris Maurer, Equality Florida's public policy director. 'Positively, with more emphasis on policy over partisanship, many of the culture war issues failed, including anti-LGBTQ legislation.' Ana Goñi-Lessan, state watchdog reporter for the USA TODAY Network – Florida, can be reached at agonilessan@ This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Florida LGBTQ advocates say every targeted bill failed this session
Yahoo
03-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Transgender student's arrest for violating Florida bathroom law is thought to be a first
A transgender college student declared 'I am here to break the law' before entering a women's restroom at the Florida State Capitol and being led out in handcuffs by police. Civil rights attorneys say the arrest of Marcy Rheintgen last month is the first they know of for violating transgender bathroom restrictions passed by numerous state legislatures across the country. Capitol police had been alerted and were waiting for Rheintgen, 20, when she entered the building in Tallahassee March 19. They told her she would receive a trespass warning once she entered the women's restroom to wash her hands and pray the rosary, but she was later placed under arrest when she refused to leave, according to an arrest affidavit. Rheintgen faces a misdemeanor trespassing charge punishable by up to 60 days in jail and is due to appear in court in May. 'I wanted people to see the absurdity of this law in practice,' Rheintgen told The Associated Press. 'If I'm a criminal, it's going to be so hard for me to live a normal life, all because I washed my hands. Like, that's so insane.' At least 14 states have adopted laws barring transgender women from entering women's bathrooms at public schools and, in some cases, other government buildings. Only two — Florida and Utah — criminalize the act. Rheintgen's arrest in Florida is the first that American Civil Liberties Union attorneys are aware of in any state with a criminal ban, senior staff attorney Jon Davidson said. Rheintgen was in town visiting her grandparents when she decided to pen a letter to each of Florida's 160 state lawmakers informing them of her plan to enter a public restroom inconsistent with her sex assigned at birth. The Illinois resident said her act of civil disobedience was fueled by anger at seeing a place she loves and visits regularly grow hostile toward trans people. 'I know that you know in your heart that this law is wrong and unjust,' she wrote in her letter to lawmakers. 'I know that you know in your heart that transgender people are human too, and that you can't arrest us away. I know that you know that I have dignity. That's why I know that you won't arrest me.' Her arrest comes as many Republican-led states that have enacted restroom restrictions grapple with how to enforce them. Laws in Alabama, Kansas, Kentucky and North Dakota do not spell out any enforcement mechanism, and even the state laws that do largely rely on private individuals to report violations. In Utah, activists flooded a tip line created to alert state officials to possible violations of its bathroom law with thousands of hoax reports in an effort to shield transgender residents and their allies from any legitimate complaints that could lead to an investigation. Supporters of the laws say they are needed to protect women and girls in private single-sex spaces. Opponents such as Nadine Smith, executive director of the LGBTQ+ advocacy group Equality Florida, say they create dangerous situations for all by giving people license to police others' bodies in bathrooms. 'The arrest of Marcy Rheintgen is not about safety," Smith said. "It's about cruelty, humiliation and the deliberate erosion of human dignity. Transgender people have been using restrooms aligned with their gender for generations without incident. What's changed is not their presence — it's a wave of laws designed to intimidate them out of public life.' If Rheintgen is convicted, she worries she could be jailed with men, forced to cut her long hair and prevented temporarily from taking gender-affirming hormones. 'People are telling me it's a legal test, like this is the first case that's being brought," she said. 'It's how they test the law. But I didn't do this to test the law. I did it because I was upset. I can't have any expectations for what's going to happen because this has never been prosecuted before. I'm horrified and scared.' ___ Associated Press writer Kate Payne contributed reporting from Tallahassee.
The Independent
03-04-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
Transgender student's arrest for violating Florida bathroom law is thought to be a first
A transgender college student declared 'I am here to break the law' before entering a women's restroom at the Florida State Capitol and being led out in handcuffs by police. Civil rights attorneys say the arrest of Marcy Rheintgen last month is the first they know of for violating transgender bathroom restrictions passed by numerous state legislatures across the country. Capitol police had been alerted and were waiting for Rheintgen, 20, when she entered the building in Tallahassee March 19. They told her she would receive a trespass warning once she entered the women's restroom to wash her hands and pray the rosary, but she was later placed under arrest when she refused to leave, according to an arrest affidavit. Rheintgen faces a misdemeanor trespassing charge punishable by up to 60 days in jail and is due to appear in court in May. 'I wanted people to see the absurdity of this law in practice,' Rheintgen told The Associated Press. 'If I'm a criminal, it's going to be so hard for me to live a normal life, all because I washed my hands. Like, that's so insane.' At least 14 states have adopted laws barring transgender women from entering women's bathrooms at public schools and, in some cases, other government buildings. Only two — Florida and Utah — criminalize the act. Rheintgen's arrest in Florida is the first that American Civil Liberties Union attorneys are aware of in any state with a criminal ban, senior staff attorney Jon Davidson said. Rheintgen was in town visiting her grandparents when she decided to pen a letter to each of Florida's 160 state lawmakers informing them of her plan to enter a public restroom inconsistent with her sex assigned at birth. The Illinois resident said her act of civil disobedience was fueled by anger at seeing a place she loves and visits regularly grow hostile toward trans people. 'I know that you know in your heart that this law is wrong and unjust,' she wrote in her letter to lawmakers. 'I know that you know in your heart that transgender people are human too, and that you can't arrest us away. I know that you know that I have dignity. That's why I know that you won't arrest me.' Her arrest comes as many Republican-led states that have enacted restroom restrictions grapple with how to enforce them. Laws in Alabama, Kansas, Kentucky and North Dakota do not spell out any enforcement mechanism, and even the state laws that do largely rely on private individuals to report violations. In Utah, activists flooded a tip line created to alert state officials to possible violations of its bathroom law with thousands of hoax reports in an effort to shield transgender residents and their allies from any legitimate complaints that could lead to an investigation. Supporters of the laws say they are needed to protect women and girls in private single-sex spaces. Opponents such as Nadine Smith, executive director of the LGBTQ+ advocacy group Equality Florida, say they create dangerous situations for all by giving people license to police others' bodies in bathrooms. 'The arrest of Marcy Rheintgen is not about safety," Smith said. "It's about cruelty, humiliation and the deliberate erosion of human dignity. Transgender people have been using restrooms aligned with their gender for generations without incident. What's changed is not their presence — it's a wave of laws designed to intimidate them out of public life.' If Rheintgen is convicted, she worries she could be jailed with men, forced to cut her long hair and prevented temporarily from taking gender-affirming hormones. ' People are telling me it's a legal test, like this is the first case that's being brought," she said. 'It's how they test the law. But I didn't do this to test the law. I did it because I was upset. I can't have any expectations for what's going to happen because this has never been prosecuted before. I'm horrified and scared.' ___
