Mississippi’s Republican-controlled Senate passed House Bill 1125 which will prohibit gender-affirming care for individuals under 18 years old. Governor Tate Reeves plans to sign the bill, which is part of a broader conservative push to restrict transgender athletes, gender-affirming care, and drag shows. Reeves, who signed a law in 2021 to ban transgender athletes from girls’ or women’s sports, believes that “Sterilizing and castrating children in the name of new gender ideology is wrong.” This new bill comes after Utah’s Republican governor recently signed a ban on gender-affirming care, and similar laws in Arkansas and Alabama were temporarily blocked by judges.
The Mississippi Senate voted 33-15 to pass House Bill 1125, while the majority-Republican Senate in Arkansas approved legislation to effectively reinstate its ban on gender-affirming care for minors. The proposed law in Arkansas would allow someone who received gender-affirming care as a minor to file malpractice claims for up to 15 years after they turn 18. Legal experts warned that this proposal would be a significant shift in malpractice law and could make it challenging for doctors to obtain malpractice insurance for providing gender-affirming care to minors.
Jensen Luke Matar, executive director of the Mississippi-based Transgender Resources Advocacy Network and Services Program, criticized the bill, stating that “patients, along with their healthcare providers — not politicians –- should decide what medical care is in the best interest of a patient.” Democratic Senator Rod Hickman of Macon attempted to amend the bill to allow mental health care to remain available for transgender people under 18, but the amendment was rejected. Hickman warned that the bill “furthers the narrative that these individuals are not human beings deserving of the same rights that we all have.”
The ACLU of Mississippi has urged Governor Reeves to veto the bill, stating that “this law shuts the door on best-practice medical care and puts politics between parents, their children, and their doctors.” While the Heritage Action group affiliated with the Heritage Foundation in Washington praised the passage of the bill, the Human Rights Campaign condemned the bill, stating that “Governor Reeves is once again attacking trans youth, playing politics with their lives, and sending a cruel message to trans young people.”
