Over the weekend the Biden-Harris Administration released a report “Memorializing Transgender Day of Remembrance” and touting the White House’s pro-LGBT activism.
Among other things, the report highlight’s the administration work to undermine Arkansas’ Save Adolescents From Experimentation (SAFE) Act in federal court, calling the SAFE Act “discriminatory and unconstitutional.”
The SAFE Act is a 2021 law that protects children in Arkansas from sex-reassignment procedures, puberty blockers, and cross-sex hormones.
The law passed with overwhelming support in the Arkansas Legislature. However, the ACLU filed a lawsuit to have the SAFE Act struck down, and the law currently is tied up in federal court.
In June President Biden’s U.S. Department of Justice filed a statement of interest opposing Arkansas’ SAFE Act in federal court.
The DOJ’s statement of interest calls sex-reassignment procedures “life-saving care” and argues that the SAFE Act violates the U.S. Constitution.
It also claims that Arkansas’ reasons for supporting the SAFE Act are “mere pretext for animus against transgender minors” — in other words, that Arkansas’ lawmakers passed the SAFE Act because they secretly hate transgender children.
The fact of the matter is researchers do not know the long term effects that puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones have on kids. Doctors are giving these hormones to children off-label, in a manner the FDA never intended.
That is why many experts agree that giving puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to children is experimental, at best.
That’s also why a major hospital in Sweden announced last spring that it would no longer administer puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to children.
It is deeply disappointing that the federal government would continue using taxpayer resources to oppose a state law that protects children from experimentation. Fortunately, Arkansas is fighting back, and we believe the federal courts ultimately will uphold this good law.