Gov. Chris Sununu, R-NH, on Friday signed three bills aimed at defending against gender ideology being forced on children and families.
The socially liberal Sununu signed House Bill 619, an “ACT to require a person to attain the age of majority for genital gender reassignment surgery,” which also allows children or their parents to sue doctors who performed such surgeries for a period of two years after the procedures.
Earlier reports noted that the initial versions of the legislation, which also addresses “informed consent,” included protection for children and teens from puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and other surgeries such as double mastectomies. The final version that passed the legislature, however, only prohibits genital surgeries.
“HB 619 ensures that life altering, irreversible surgeries will not be performed on children,” Sununu said in his statement regarding the measure:
This bill focuses on protecting the health and safety of New Hampshire’s children and has earned bipartisan support. There is a reason that countries across the world – from Sweden to Norway, France, and the United Kingdom – have taken steps to pause these procedures and policies.
Ironically, however, even the left-leaning new Labour government in the UK said it plans to reaffirm a raft of temporary measures protecting minors from puberty blockers – rules initiated by Labour’s more conservative Tory predecessors. The UK plan is based on the blockbuster independent review of so-called “gender-affirming care” procedures led by British pediatrician Dr. Hilary Cass, who concluded the model of medical intervention for young people is based on “remarkably weak evidence.”
“The reality is that we have no good evidence on the long-term outcomes of interventions to manage gender-related distress,” Cass wrote, observing that puberty blockers were found in “multiple studies” within her team’s systematic review to compromise bone density and fertility and lead to other harmful effects.
Additionally, she noted that most children and adolescents who are prescribed puberty blockers end up moving on to cross-sex hormones.
In his statement, Sununu also seemed to give a pass of sorts to the current U.S. federal government and a major medical organization that has backed so-called “gender-affirming care.” The governor claimed: “Even the Biden Administration opposes these youth surgeries, citing the American Academy of Pediatrics.”
A recent New York Times report, however, revealed court documents showing the Biden-Harris Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) pressured the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) to remove from its draft guidelines its recommended age minimums for gender hormone drugs and surgeries in order to make it easier to subject children to such interventions.
Email excerpts from the court documents uncovered the chief of staff for Assistant Secretary for Health Rachel (born Richard) Levine, a man who calls himself a woman, urging that the age minimums for the experimental drugs and surgeries be removed from the draft in order to foster the administration’s pro-“transgender” political agenda.
But, in a later report at The Times, the Biden-Harris administration said it was opposed to “gender-affirming surgery” for minors.
“Adm. Levine shared her view with her staff that publishing the proposed lower ages for gender transition surgeries was not supported by science or research, and could lead to an onslaught of attacks on the transgender community,” an HHS spokesman said in a statement to the news outlet.
The Times also reported, however, that the Biden-Harris administration’s stated opposition to “trans” surgeries for minors has not been clear at all:
Federal officials did not elaborate further on the administration’s position regarding the scientific research or on Adm. Levine’s role in having the age minimums removed.
…
The Biden administration’s previous statements on gender-affirming care for minors have not in the past explicitly opposed surgery.
The Maine Wire observed as well that, while Sununu asserted HB 619 ends “life-altering, irreversible surgeries,” its “actual scope is far narrower than his statement would suggest”:
The bill only forbids doctors from performing genital reassignment surgery on minors but nevertheless allows other life-altering, irreversible surgeries such as double mastectomies, in which a woman’s breasts are surgically removed, to continue being performed on teenaged girls.
Sununu also signed into law House Bill 1205, which prohibits boys from playing on middle and high school girls’ athletic teams.
The legislation “requires schools to designate athletics by sex and prohibits biological males from participating in female athletics.”
“HB 1205 ensures fairness and safety in women’s sports by maintaining integrity and competitive balance in athletic competitions,” the governor said. “With this widely supported step, New Hampshire joins nearly half of all U.S. States in taking this measure.”
Sununu said the two bills “reflect commonsense, bipartisan solutions that reflect the values of parents across our state.”
“The vast majority of Granite Staters share in this approach – because it is fair, balanced, and void of political considerations,” he stressed. “By enacting these measures, we continue to uphold the principles of safety, fairness, and common sense for all our citizens.”
Democratic candidate for governor Cinde Warmington opposed both the bill protecting women’s sports and the bill protecting children from “trans” surgeries.
“It is extremely disappointing to see Governor Sununu participate in the Republican Party’s continued bullying of children,” Warmington said, as the NH Journal reported.
Under a third measure, House Bill 1312, school districts will be required to provide at least two weeks’ advance notice to parents of “any curriculum course material used for instruction or program of human sexuality, [or] human sexual education, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, or gender expression.”
Parents who object to course material can opt their child out of that class, provided they notify staff in writing and propose alternative coursework and pay for it themselves, if necessary.
Additionally, school districts are prohibited from adopting policies that block school district staff from responding to parents’ questions about a child’s “mental, emotional, or physical health or well-being, sexuality, or a change in related services or monitoring, or that encourage or have the effect of encouraging a student to withhold from a parent such information.”
New Hampshire-based parent advocate Ann Marie Banfield told CatholicVote, nevertheless:
These are topics that should have already been transparent to parents and community members who pay the bills in their school district. No adult, working in the school system, should be hiding any of the curriculum or materials from parents. This is good for parents but it’s also good for public schools. Transparency builds trust, and that’s good for everyone.
Sununu vetoed House Bill 396, which would have permitted private businesses and government agencies to classify people based on their sex in cases related to bathroom or locker room use, decisions regarding who can participate in sports segregated by gender, and decisions about whether an individual is sent to a men’s or a women’s prison.
“In 2018, Republicans and Democrats passed legislation to prevent discrimination because as I said at the time, it is unacceptable and runs contrary to New Hampshire’s Live Free or Die Spirit,” the governor said in his veto statement. “That still rings true today. The challenge with HB396 is that in some cases it seeks to solve problems that have not presented themselves in New Hampshire, and in doing so invites unnecessary discord.”
“By vetoing the bill, Sununu is potentially allowing biological males to be sent to women’s prisons, where they will pose a serious risk to the women housed with them,” observed The Maine Wire.
