A bill that would shield anyone who takes a transgender child away from “non-affirming” families and subjects that child to experimentation with transitory health interventions is being considered by the Maine House of Representatives. Additionally, the legislation would repeal state laws that shield minors from such “care” in other states.
In custody disputes, “gender-affirming treatment” may be prioritized under the Maine bill, LD 1735. If people took a child from someone else with legal custody—such as parents—for the purpose of obtaining gender-affirming health care for the child, it would be illegal for judges to take that person’s request for custody into account. This is true even if the state restricts this experimental “care.”
This means that judges in custody circumstances would have to be sympathetic toward anyone who takes a child away from their parents, provided that person does so in order to assist the child in receiving experimental transgender “treatments” that could result in stunting, scarring, and infertility.
These interventions, which frequently amount to chemical castration, are insisted upon by some activists and their friends who have infiltrated health maintenance organizations in order to stop gender-confused children from committing suicide. With the help of this perverse reasoning, activists can assert that a child suffers “mental harm” because their parents disagree on their gender identity.
It takes many levels of doublespeak to defend the absurd notion that a father abusing his daughter by refusing to sign up the path leading to the removal of healthy breasts and an unhealthy womb. To hide the reality of what is happening, fake terms like “gender- affirming care” are required.
The Maine bill, however, goes all-in on this misleading claim, from the name (“An Act to Safeguard Gender-Confirming Health Care”) to the definition framing these treatments as “medically necessary health care that respects the gender identity of the individual, as experienced and defined by a person.” Keep in mind that the description does not specify that a health professional must approve or reject the diagnosis.
The bill’s focus on “gender-affirming care” ignores the testimony of doctors who caution that even the “social transition,” which encourages boys to present as girls, “is a powerful therapeutic intervention that radically changes outcomes.” Doctors also caution that children cannot possibly consent in advance to procedures that could sterilize them and expose them to long-term side effects like reduced bone density and cardiovascular disease.
However, LD 1735 would treat any rejection of these treatments as child abuse, making them sacrosanct. In situations where the child must be protected, the bill would grant Maine courts “temporary emergency jurisdiction” because the child hasn’t been able to get gender-affirming medical care or mental health care.
In custody cases, this “temporary emergency jurisdiction” now applies to child abandonment and circumstances where “it is necessary in an emergency to protect the child because it is subjected to or threatened with mistreatment or abuse.” The bill would only expand this list of emergency conditions to include the inability to get “gender-affirming health care.”
In addition, LD 1735 may forbid law enforcement in the Pine Tree State from detaining or aiding in extradition of someone who violated “another state’s law against providing, receiving, or allowing a child to get gender-affirming health care in this state.” It may prevent law enforcement from informing a state agency about any care provided in Maine.
The bill also states that “the lowest law enforcement priority is an out-of-state arrest warrant for an individual who violates another state’s law by providing, receiving, or allowing a child to receive gender-affirming medical care or mental health care.”
The bill may make it possible for Sage, a girl who was urged to keep her grandmother in the dark about her transgender identity, to engage in child sex trafficking.
Sage allegedly fled after being victimized in a boys’ restroom at school, according to her grandmother, and later ended up being kidnapped, raped by her attackers.
A Maryland attorney fought to keep Sage away from her mother after Sage was transported from Virginia to Maryland across state lines. A Virginia bill intended to stop Sage’s tragedy from occurring again failed in the Democratic-majority Senate of the Old Dominion next February.
According to Jay Richards, chairman of the Richard and Helen DeVos Center for Life, Religion, and Family at The Heritage Foundation, this bill would effectively make Maine a party to the smuggling of minors from different states. (The Daily Signal is the news outlet of The Heritage Foundation.)
According to Richards, the Maine bill “would attract troubled teenagers from various states that have protected them from receiving ghastly sex trait-modifying drugs and surgery.” “There is plenty of evidence of their harms and no good evidence that such health interventions help juveniles.”
The bill is also opposed by Alvin Lui, leader of the parental rights organization Courage is a Habit.
According to Lui, “LD 1735 is a trans trafficking bill that would allow the state of Maine to take minors from various states seeking transgender treatments, such as chest binding,
penis tucking, inevitable puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, or mutilation surgeries.”
Whether or not they reside in Maine, Courage Is a Habit has urged Americans to get in touch with Maine politicians about the bill.
The bill will be discussed by the Maine House Judiciary Committee on Thursday. The pro-transgender Movement Advancement Project claims that 14 states have executive orders or laws that “shield” those who carry out experimental transgender health interventions from laws in other states.
The same kinds of legal provisions that might protect criminals may be included in these laws.
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