The Governor and Attorney General of Texas, who face competitive Republican primaries on March 1, issued documents this week that share an opinion changing what constitutes child abuse in Texas. Teachers, doctors, nurses, and other licensed professionals with a ‘duty to report’ child abuse under state law will now face penalties if they don’t report caregivers who fall under this new opinion of child abuse. Specifically, parents who get their children medical care, including prescribed medications, will now be considered child abusers by the state if their child is transgender and receiving gender-affirming care. Gender-affirming care in this case at least references hormones and puberty blocking drugs.
The Governor is also calling on the general public to report parents getting gender-affirming care for their child. Further, his letter to DFPS mentions “similar reporting requirements and criminal penalties for members of the general public.”
Doctors, who have a duty to report child abuse, must also stop providing gender-affirming care to their patients. Further the Governor wrote that, “other state agencies [have a duty] to investigate licensed facilities where [gender-affirming medical care] may occur.”[1] The implication is that medical providers are also supposed to report their workplaces as places child abuse may occur and face the resulting investigations.
Attorney General Paxton is also “awaiting trial for a 2015 indictment on charges of securities fraud, and he is under investigation by the FBI over allegations of bribery and abuse of office.”[2]
Last year, the state legislature failed to pass a bill that would have made providing gender-affirming medical care a felony.
Some activists are encouraging effected parents and children to leave the state.
At the same time, a parent that had AG Paxton over to her family’s trans-inclusive home for dinner in 2016 says it’s important not to tell families to flee the state. Instead, Ms. Briggle is calling for TX voters to get to the polls to vote them out in the March 1 primary and for people nationwide to call their US Senators telling them to get the Equality Act passed.
While Gov. Abbott’s and AG Paxton’s action is a legal opinion that will, at least temporarily, change enforcement of law, it is not a law itself. Organizations including Lambda Legal, the TX ACLU, and the National Center for Lesbian Rights are already engaged and preparing to support accusations against parents. In the mean time, children won’t be receiving health care treatment, they’ll be torn from their parents and into the foster system, their parents will miss work, the stress and costs of parents being investigated will harm these families for decades to come, and more.
Professionals needing TX licenses for their work have to decide which risk to take — report a supportive parent or face state charges themself. Whichever they choose, these mandatory reporters families, especially spouses and their kids, will also be effected.
The Harris County(includes Houston) elected DFPS attorney, the Travis County(including Austin) district attorney’s office, and the Travis County county attorney’s have already made public statements they will not enforce the directive.[3]
This new opinion on child abuse raises many other questions, such as, will pharmacies and pharmacists that fill prescriptions for transgender children also be placed under investigation? What does that mean for fulling other people’s prescriptions? For controlled substance prescriptions that can’t transfer pharmacies, combined with an already stretched supply chain, who won’t be able to get life sustaining medications? How many people who can’t get their medication will have to miss work and for how long? Will they end up consuming more health care resources for lack of maintenance medications thus resulting in higher health insurance premiums for their co-workers?
Will school professionals report their colleagues who do support trans students? Are those teachers then unable teach while under investigation? What does that mean for all the students of reported teachers in times when teachers are fleeing the profession and intermittently quarantining for COVID-19? The potential cascade effects of this new legal opinion outside the LGBTQ community could be vast.
The last few years have seen hundreds of specifically anti-trans bills in state legislatures. The main focuses have been bathroom bills and measures against trans student athletes. Most recently, Florida passed a “Don’t Say Gay” bill. For current details see https://www.transformationsproject.org/legislation
The Movement Advancement Project provides this map showing the status of gender identity equality policies by state.
I will continue to cover this topic as it develops.
[1] Abbott Letter to Masters. https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/21272649-abbott-letter-to-masters Contributed by Lauren McGaughty of the Dallas Morning News.
[2] https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-politics-and-policy/texas-governor-calls-citizens-report-parents-transgender-kids-abuse-rcna17455
[3] https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/02/23/greg-abbott-gender-affirming-care-child-abuse-directive/
