Last year, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz (Democrat) introduced the so-called “Trans Refugee” BillCalifornia and Some other states Passing Measures That Harm Vulnerable Youth. The Washington Post He recently defended Waltz.“Conservatives” argued that “Trump is falsely accusing states of allowing parents to revoke parental rights if they prevent their transgender children from receiving gender-affirming care.”
But in reality, there is no falsehood in that accusation. This law could indeed remove children from the custody of loving parents. Every parent in America should be concerned about this law and others like it.
Imagine a teenage girl living in Ohio who regularly visits her rather conscious aunt in Minnesota. The aunt believes that her teenage niece’s parents are not sufficiently “affirmative” of the girl’s desire to embrace a male identity. The parents know the devastating and irreparable harm that puberty suppressants and cross-sex hormones will cause their daughter, and therefore have no intention of consenting to them. The aunt files a lawsuit in Minnesota, trying to gain custody of the girl and begin drug treatment.
Normally, a Minnesota court would find Ohio to be proper venue and dismiss the case. After all, Ohio is where the niece and her parents live, and it’s where the girl’s pediatrician and counselor (who have information about her mental and physical health) are located. Attempts to gain custody out of state are typically decided based on the child’s home state.
That makes sense: custody disputes should be heard in the state where the parents, children, and relevant evidence are located, and should be decided under the laws of that state.
But Minnesota’s law and others like it ignore this common sense rule. A parent, relative, or even an unrelated adult seeking custody of a child “for the purposes of receiving gender-affirming medical care” may bring the child to Minnesota, where state courts currently have exclusive jurisdiction to hear such cases. These courts use Minnesota law to determine child custody and ultimately whether a child should be given harmful puberty-blocking drugs or cross-sex hormones.
In other words, as soon as the girl crosses the Minnesota border with or to visit her aunt, a Minnesota court is ready to strip parental rights from her Ohio parents and give them to her aunt, who can immediately begin administering dangerous transitional drugs to the girl.
Indeed, in Walz’s state of Minnesota, it is official state policy to put children on a one-way road to irreparable damage through puberty suppressants, hormones and sterilization.
Let’s not forget that just a few weeks before signing this bill, Chancellor WalzPresidential DecreeMinnesota has declared that it is committed to protecting access to transitional drugs and surgeries that face growing international evidence of irreparable harm to children’s developing bodies and brains, and to establishing the state as “a refuge for those who seek and provide them.”
And woke relatives aren’t the only ones who receive a “get out of jail free” card when they flee to Minnesota with children ripped from the arms of their parents, who are their children’s best advocates. This law gives Planned Parenthood and other gender clinics the power to push life-altering transition drugs on children without any meaningful oversight or accountability.
Under Minnesota law, Planned Parenthood can easily encourage and even cover the costs of teens traveling to the state for harmful transitional drugs, and will do so with the assurance that if parents try to step in to protect their children from the lifelong effects of these drugs, they will be protected by state law.
What the Minnesota law and laws like it actually do is deprive children of the only true shield and refuge against pervasive and harmful gender ideology: parents. Parents love their children and know them best. Only parents have the right and responsibility to raise their children and protect them from harm.
That’s why, moreFamily Stands UpThe State of Minnesota had the opportunity to stand with these brave parents and their children as government officials, schools, and even health care providers impose dangerous and life-altering gender stereotypes on children, but instead chose to declare them enemies of the state.
Matt Sharp is Alliance for Freedom He is director of the university’s Public Policy Center.
