Watch: Texas House debates bill banning puberty blockers, hormone treatments for trans kids

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Editor’s note: This story contains explicit language.

The Texas House has begun debating a proposed ban on puberty blockers and hormone therapy for transgender kids, which spurred protests that led to altercations with state police earlier this week.

Trans Texans, their families and medical groups say transition-related care is critical to supporting the mental health of trans youth, who face higher risks of depression and suicide than their cisgender peers. They consider Senate Bill 14 one of the most consequential pieces of legislation this year. And with Texas being home to one of the largest trans communities in the country, such a ban could have an outsized impact.

Before the House started its debate on the bill, House Speaker Dade Phelan said he welcomes guests in the gallery but warned against disruptions.

Under the bill, kids already accessing treatments like puberty blockers and hormone therapy would have to be “weaned off” in a “medically appropriate” manner, the bill says. It also bans transition-related surgeries, though those are rarely performed on kids.

SB 14’s supporters have challenged the research and science behind gender-affirming care. They say the legislation is an effort to save Texas families from health care providers who are cashing in on a “social contagion” and pushing life-altering treatments on kids who may later regret taking them.

But doctors and parents of trans kids say getting access to these treatments also takes time and plenty of medical evaluations. Parents are included in decisions about what treatments, if any, are best for individual children.

On Friday, LGBTQ Texans and their allies once again came to the Capitol to oppose the bill.

“The days [in the] Capitol like this are really difficult, but it’s also the most trans community I’ve ever been in,” Ash Thye, a trans college senior from Dallas who started hormone therapies at 16, said Friday prior to the vote. “We’re fighting for our fucking lives.”

Supporters of the bill, wearing red shirts with the words “save Texas kids” were also back in the gallery overlooking the chamber floor on Friday.

“I kind of get emotional because a lot of kids don’t have a voice, and I feel like I can be a voice for them,” said Lorelei Shafer, who brought her two children. “And my kids can show that — look, look at them — why would God create us just perfectly in his own image? Why would you want to destroy them?”

A recent poll from the University of Texas at Austin found that 58% of Texas voters support banning doctors from providing gender-affirming care to minors. Another of its recent surveys from February shows that 59% of voters don’t personally know an openly trans person.

The bill is a priority for Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and the Republican Party of Texas, whose platform opposes any efforts to recognize transgender identities. It and the other bills targeting LGBTQ people also come during a legislative session in which some conservative lawmakers, emboldened by the growing acceptance of Christian nationalism on the right, are pursuing bills they believe can create a national model for infusing Christianity into the public sphere.

The Senate has already passed a version of the bill and a majority of Texas House members support the legislation. If the bill becomes law, Texas will join over a dozen states in restricting transition-related care for minors. Several of those states are currently facing legal challenges from groups like the American Civil Liberties Union and Lambda Legal.

The looming prospect of losing this care has spurred some families with trans kids to start planning for ways to get treatments outside of the state or flee Texas entirely. But traveling or moving is cost prohibitive for some families. Many parents of trans kids have also testified about having been in Texas for generations and not wanting to uproot themselves from the communities that they love.

On Tuesday, Rep. Mary González, D-Clint, successfully cut short the debate on SB 14 with a parliamentary maneuver. The move kicked the bill back to the House Public Health Committee, which quickly convened Tuesday in a third-floor room — packed with state representatives, legislative staffers, parents of trans kids and LGBTQ advocates — to fix an error in the bill analysis that González flagged. The Republican-dominated committee quickly voted 6-5 the same afternoon to send the legislation back to the chamber floor.

As lawmakers exited following that committee vote, the Rev. Mary Street Wilson shouted, “Shame on you!”

Wilson was one of several faith leaders present at the Capitol on Tuesday to protest SB 14 as part of Texas Freedom Network’s Just Texas project.

“Whenever this bill does pass, what’s going to happen to them the next day? Absolutely nothing,” she later said to The Texas Tribune. “What’s going to happen to these families? Their world comes apart. … It makes me absolutely furious.”

On Thursday, a coalition of advocacy groups had raised a call to action to shut down SB 14 and other bills in a slate of legislation filed by Texas Republicans that could upend the lives of LGBTQ Texans.

“Living through history is not something we’ve asked for, but these are the cards that we have been dealt,” Ricardo Martinez, CEO of Equality Texas, said Thursday. “Will we roll over when democracy is threatened, or will we rise up and claim our stake in the world where we fight for our right to life, liberty and happiness? For us, the choice is clear. We will continue to fight.”

LGBTQ Texans and advocates also criticized the state’s reaction to Tuesday’s vocal protests in the House, which Phelan called a “breach of decorum.” When the bill first came to the chamber floor Tuesday, critics in the gallery started chanting and unrolling banners in support of trans kids. Phelan quickly ordered that the gallery be cleared. They have similarly condemned state police’s use of force against protesters during the clearing, especially as they physically restrained and charged two with crimes.

The misdemeanor and felony charges against Adri Pérez, an organizing director with the Texas Freedom Network, have since been cleared. The status of the misdemeanor charge against the second individual, Evan Wienck, is currently unclear.

LGBTQ groups have since held a de-escalation training for their members, according to Andrea Segovia, senior field and policy adviser for the Transgender Education Network of Texas. They also hosted a safety briefing in the Capitol Friday morning before the expected debate.

In the days following the Tuesday delay, 16-year-old Randell, a trans North Texan, found it difficult to follow updates about SB 14. And in the lead-up to the Friday debate, the teen, who is usually quick to laugh, was just sad and angry. Randell agreed to speak with the Tribune only if his full name isn’t used in order to protect his safety.

“In my brain, it’s fully inevitable,” he said Wednesday. “In my brain, it’s already happened, and I’ve already moved to another state.”

Renzo Downey contributed to this story.

Disclosure: Equality Texas, Texas Freedom Network and University of Texas at Austin have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete list of them here.

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