Wisconsin Assembly passes trio of bills targeting transgender youth

The Republican-controlled Wisconsin Assembly on Thursday passed a trio of bills targeting transgender young people. The legislation, which would ban gender-affirming health care for minors and prevent transgender girls from competing on women’s K-12 and college sports teams, now heads to the state Senate, where the proposals are expected to pass.

The three bills were each approved in a 63-35 party-line vote, with all Democrats voting against the measures and nearly all Republicans voting for them. Republican state Rep. Todd Novak was absent for Thursday’s vote but said he would have joined his GOP colleagues in supporting the bills.

Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat, has pledged to veto all three bills if they reach his desk.

“We’re gonna veto every single one of them,” Evers told a group of LGBTQ advocates and youth gathered at the state capitol in Madison this month. In a Thursday post on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, Evers called the GOP-led bills “scary” and “downright dangerous.”

“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again — not one of these bills will become law in Wisconsin as long as I am governor. Period,” he wrote.

The health care ban, Assembly Bill 465, would prohibit health care providers in the state from administering gender-affirming medical care to transgender minors “for the purpose of changing the minor’s body to correspond to a sex that is discordant with the minor’s biological sex.”

Medications including puberty blockers and hormones, as well as certain surgeries, would still be available to minors “born with a medically verifiable genetic disorder of sex development,” according to the bill. Doctors who violate the law, if it is enacted, could lose their medical licenses.

Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, a Republican, on Thursday said providers of gender-affirming health care are “mutilating” children and falsely suggested care is being given to transgender youths as young as 3 years old. The only acceptable form of gender-affirming care for minors who have not begun puberty is social transition, which includes wearing gender-affirming clothing or using a different name or pronouns.

Vos also likened gender-affirming medical care to lobotomies and said the opinions of medical experts — who overwhelmingly support gender-affirming care for transgender youths and adults — are likely to change.

“People a hundred years ago said the way to deal with mental illness was to lobotomize the mentally ill. That was settled science,” Vos said Thursday on the Assembly Floor. “You know what we realized a hundred years later? That was cruel and it should have never been done in America, because we realized that ‘settled science’ doesn’t always mean that they’re right.”

Vos spoke immediately after Democratic state Rep. Melissa Ratcliff, whose son is transgender, described gender-affirming health care as lifesaving.

“This legislation takes away the ability of parents to help children like I was able to help mine,” she said.

The bills restricting transgender athlete participation — Assembly Bill 377 and Assembly Bill 379 — would bar transgender students from participating on K-12 and college sports teams consistent with their gender identity. A similar proposal was advanced by Assembly Republicans in 2021, but failed to progress in the Senate.

LGBTQ advocacy and civil rights groups on Thursday condemned the bills’ passage in the Wisconsin Assembly and called on the Senate to strike the proposals down.

“Let’s get the record straight. The legislation passed today will only make it difficult or impossible for a transgender or non-binary child to grow up as their authentic self,” said Wendy Strout, the Human Rights Campaign’s Wisconsin state director.

“All young people deserve to feel supported, valued and cared for, but the assembly representatives who voted in favor of these bills today sent a message to trans youth that they are the exception,” said Dr. Melinda Brennan, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin, in a statement.

“Life’s problems don’t come from being trans — they come from barriers to living openly and authentically,” Brennan said. “If politicians want to help youth, they need to make sure young people know that they belong, can pursue the activities they enjoy, have access to the healthcare they need, see themselves reflected in their books and curriculum, and — like everyone — feel respected for who they are.”