Ohio Republican governor vetoes bill banning care for Transgender minors

Ohio Governor Mike DeWine vetoed a bill on Friday (Dec 29) that upon becoming a law, would have restricted gender-affirming care for minors and transgender girls’ participation in sports. Dewine therefore rejected the legislation pushed by his Republican colleagues and by others in his party around the country. 

Republican governors have vetoed similar bills before as well, and the frequency of such vetoes shows growing liberal attitudes among the Republicans for the LGBTQ+ community despite the noted disinformation about the community that the members of the Grand Old Party have spread in the past.

In 2021, Arkansas then-Governor Asa Hutchinson vetoed a bill that would have made his state the first to ban gender-affirming treatments or surgeries for transgender minors. 

Republican governors in Indiana and Utah last year vetoed bills that would have barred transgender girls from competing in female sports at school.

DeWine said he decided after meeting with doctors, families, and lawmakers by recognising views from all sides. 

Some parents, he said, told him they weren’t sure their children would be alive today without gender-affirming treatment. 

“This bill would impact a very small number of Ohio’s children. But for those children who face gender dysphoria and for their families, the consequences of this bill cannot be more profound,” DeWine said during a Friday press conference. 

Also watch | US House passes bill banning transgender students from women’s sports

“Ultimately, I believe this is about protecting human life.”

Approving such legislation, DeWine said, would suggest the state holds more authority to determine what is medically best for a child than the parents. 

Lawmakers passed the legislation earlier in December largely along party lines before sending it to the governor. 

Republicans hold a supermajority in both chambers of the state legislature. Therefore, it is possible for them to override DeWine’s veto. 

Ohio’s bill, upon becoming law, would prohibit physicians from prescribing hormone treatments or puberty blockers to minors seeking to transition. It would also restrict them from performing gender-reassignment surgeries on minors. 

The legislation, however, would allow minors already receiving treatments such as puberty blockers to continue to do so.

In the recent past, several states in the US have passed bills banning certain gender-based therapies and surgeries for children and teenagers with or without parental consent.