Issued on: 28/04/2023
03:16
‘Lifesaving’: US family flees Texas to transgender 'refuge' Minnesota
(2023) © AFP / France 24
Video by: Juliette MONTILLY
Jasper, 16, relocated from Texas to Minnesota with their parents to escape from the alarming increase in bills targeting transgender youth. "I feel like this is much, much safer," says Mary, the mother of Jasper. Like them, many US families with transgender children are fleeing to this northern state bordering Canada. Minnesota recently passed a "trans refuge" law that would guarantee legal protection for trans people coming from elsewhere to access medical care.
Jasper, 16, relocated from Texas to Minnesota with their parents to escape from the alarming increase in bills targeting transgender youth. "I feel like this is much, much safer," says Mary, the mother of Jasper. Like them, many US families with transgender children are fleeing to this northern state bordering Canada. Minnesota recently passed a "trans refuge" law that would guarantee legal protection for trans people coming from elsewhere to access medical care.
Washington, Minnesota protect access to abortion, gender-affirming care
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee signed five bills on Thursday from the campus of the University of Washington in Seattle to protect access to abortion and gender-affirming care.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee signed five bills on Thursday from the campus of the University of Washington in Seattle to protect access to abortion and gender-affirming care.
Image courtesy of Washington Gov. Jay Inslee/Release
April 27 (UPI) -- The Democratic governors of Washington and Minnesota on Thursday signed legislation to protect access to abortion and gender-affirming care in their states as their Republican counterparts the nation over seek to restrict and ban the medical procedures.
The move comes as both medical treatments have come under attack by Republican-led states, resulting in more than a dozen to ban abortion following last summer's U.S. Supreme Court decision to repeal federal protections for the procedure.
RELATED Polling reveals views on abortion vary by age, race, geography
He also signed House Bill 1340, which protects healthcare providers from disciplinary actions, and the so-called My Health, My Data Act, which state Democrats call a "historic and first-in-the-nation solution" to protect the personal health information collected by websites, smartphone apps and health tracking devices, with intent to protect those who visit the state for abortion or gender-affirming care.
Senate Bill 5242, which increases access to abortion care by eliminating cost-sharing abortions, and Senate Bill 5768, which protects access to abortion-inducting medication mifepristone amid Republican-led litigation to end its use, were also signed Thursday.
"The right of choice is an issue of freedom," Inslee said in a statement. "Healthcare must remain the providence of individual Washingtonians. These laws will keep the tentacles of oppressive and overreaching states out of Washington."
RELATED Justice Department challenges Tennessee's law banning youth transgender care
The signings were met with cheers from the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington, which described the state as demonstrating that it's a leader in protecting and improving access to both reproductive and gender-affirming healthcare.
"These bills are important steps toward defending and expanding abortion and gender-affirming care access, here and through their example, across the country," Leah Rutman, healthcare and liberty policy counsel at the ACLU of Washington, said in a statement.
In Minnesota, Gov. Tim Walz signed a pair of bills that protect people traveling from out-of-state for abortion and gender-affirming care with a third measure signed to ban conversion therapy, making the Midwestern state the 21st to do so, according to the Movement Advancement Project.
RELATED Missouri judge delays emergency rule restricting gender-affirming healthcare
"In Minnesota, we're protecting rights -- not taking them away," he tweeted.
State Rep. Leigh Rinke, Minnesota's first transgender lawmaker, called Thursday "an amazing, celebratory day in the movement for a more just future."
April 27 (UPI) -- The Democratic governors of Washington and Minnesota on Thursday signed legislation to protect access to abortion and gender-affirming care in their states as their Republican counterparts the nation over seek to restrict and ban the medical procedures.
The move comes as both medical treatments have come under attack by Republican-led states, resulting in more than a dozen to ban abortion following last summer's U.S. Supreme Court decision to repeal federal protections for the procedure.
More than 15 states have also banned gender-affirming care for minors, according to the Movement Advancement Project, despite most major medical associations supporting such treatment while calling on politicians to leave medical decisions to patients and their doctors.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee signed House Bill 1469 to prohibit compliance with out-of-state subpoenas related to abortion and gender-affirming-care services and abortion- and gender-affirming care-related extradition requests as well as prevent cooperation with related out-of-state investigations while protecting providers in-state from harassment.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee signed House Bill 1469 to prohibit compliance with out-of-state subpoenas related to abortion and gender-affirming-care services and abortion- and gender-affirming care-related extradition requests as well as prevent cooperation with related out-of-state investigations while protecting providers in-state from harassment.
RELATED Polling reveals views on abortion vary by age, race, geography
He also signed House Bill 1340, which protects healthcare providers from disciplinary actions, and the so-called My Health, My Data Act, which state Democrats call a "historic and first-in-the-nation solution" to protect the personal health information collected by websites, smartphone apps and health tracking devices, with intent to protect those who visit the state for abortion or gender-affirming care.
Senate Bill 5242, which increases access to abortion care by eliminating cost-sharing abortions, and Senate Bill 5768, which protects access to abortion-inducting medication mifepristone amid Republican-led litigation to end its use, were also signed Thursday.
"The right of choice is an issue of freedom," Inslee said in a statement. "Healthcare must remain the providence of individual Washingtonians. These laws will keep the tentacles of oppressive and overreaching states out of Washington."
RELATED Justice Department challenges Tennessee's law banning youth transgender care
The signings were met with cheers from the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington, which described the state as demonstrating that it's a leader in protecting and improving access to both reproductive and gender-affirming healthcare.
"These bills are important steps toward defending and expanding abortion and gender-affirming care access, here and through their example, across the country," Leah Rutman, healthcare and liberty policy counsel at the ACLU of Washington, said in a statement.
In Minnesota, Gov. Tim Walz signed a pair of bills that protect people traveling from out-of-state for abortion and gender-affirming care with a third measure signed to ban conversion therapy, making the Midwestern state the 21st to do so, according to the Movement Advancement Project.
RELATED Missouri judge delays emergency rule restricting gender-affirming healthcare
"In Minnesota, we're protecting rights -- not taking them away," he tweeted.
State Rep. Leigh Rinke, Minnesota's first transgender lawmaker, called Thursday "an amazing, celebratory day in the movement for a more just future."
Cosmetic to critical: Blue states help trans health coverage
By CLAIRE RUSH
By CLAIRE RUSH
April 26, 2023
Blue states bolster trans health coverage
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — For most of her life in New Mexico, Christina Wood felt like she had to hide her identity as a transgender woman. So six years ago she moved to Oregon, where she had readier access to the gender-affirming health care she needed to live as her authentic self.
Once there, Wood, 49, was able to receive certain surgeries that helped her transition, but electrolysis, or permanent hair removal, wasn’t fully covered under the state’s Medicaid plan for low-income residents. Paying out-of-pocket ate up nearly half her monthly income, but it was critical for Wood’s mental health.
“Having this facial hair or this body hair, it doesn’t make me feel feminine. I still look in the mirror and I see that masculine person,” she said. “It’s stressful. It causes anxiety and PTSD when you’re having to live in this body that you don’t feel like you should be in.”
Christina Wood shaves before work in her home. (AP Photo/Amanda Loman)
That is likely about to change. Oregon lawmakers are expected to pass a bill that would further expand insurance coverage for gender-affirming care to include things like facial hair removal and Adam’s apple reduction surgery, procedures currently considered cosmetic by insurers but seen as critical to the mental health of transitioning women.
The wide-ranging bill is part of a wave of legislation this year in Democratic-led states intended to carve out safe havens amid a conservative movement that seeks to ban or limit gender-affirming care elsewhere, eliminate some rights and protections for transgender people and even bar discussion of their existence in settings such as classrooms.
RELATED COVERAGE
– Michigan adds LGBTQ protections to anti-discrimination law
More than a half-dozen states, from New Jersey to Vermont to Colorado, have passed or are considering bills or executive orders around transgender health care, civil rights and other legal protections. In Michigan, for example, Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer last month signed a bill outlawing discrimination on the basis of gender identity and sexual orientation for the first time in her state.
“Trans people are just being used as a political punching bag,” said Rose Saxe, deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s LGBT and HIV Project. “Denying this health care doesn’t make them not trans. It just makes their lives much harder.”
Gender-affirming care includes a wide range of social and medical interventions, such as hormone treatments, counseling, puberty blockers and surgery.
Oregon’s bill would bar insurers and the state’s Medicaid plan from defining procedures like electrolysis as cosmetic when they are prescribed as medically necessary for treating gender dysphoria. It also would shield providers and patients from lawsuits originating in states where such procedures are restricted.
“We’re actually very committed to accessibility of coverage. Because you can say something is legal, but if it’s not truly affordable or accessible, that is not a full promise,” said Democratic state Rep. Andrea Valderrama, the bill’s chief sponsor.
Access to procedures such as electrolysis is also necessary as a matter of public safety, said Blair Stenvick, communications manager for the LGBTQ+ advocacy group Basic Rights Oregon.
“Facial hair can be a trigger for harassment,” Stenvick said, and being able to present as a woman “helps folks to not get targeted and identified as a trans person and then attacked.”
The bill has sparked fervent debate, with hundreds of people submitting written testimony both for and against it and an emotionally charged public hearing at the Capitol in Salem last month that went on for several hours. The Democratic-controlled House is expected to vote on the bill Monday over Republican opposition before it heads to the Senate, which is also dominated by Democrats.
Oregon’s measure mirrors a nationwide trend in Democratic-led states.
Shield protections similar to what is being proposed in Oregon have been enacted this year in Colorado, Illinois, New Jersey and New Mexico, and other bills are awaiting the signatures of Govs. Jay Inslee in Washington and Tim Walz in Minnesota. California, Massachusetts and Connecticut passed their own measures last year. They largely bar authorities from complying with subpoenas, arrest warrants or extradition requests from states that have banned gender-affirming treatments.
Meanwhile a measure passed last month by lawmakers in Maryland would expand the list of procedures covered by Medicaid, and Democratic Gov. Wes Moore has said he plans to sign it.
And lawmakers in Nevada’s Democratic-held Legislature are also pushing to expand gender-affirming health care and develop policies regarding the treatment of transgender prisoners, among other things.
The series of bills face an uncertain fate under Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo, who has shied away from the anti-transgender rhetoric and policy proposals that fellow GOP officeholders and candidates across the country have embraced. Lawmakers have just over a month to vote on them before the legislative session ends in June. But regardless of their outcome, an open debate over transgender health care protections in the important swing state promises to further heighten national attention on the issue.
“They know that this is not a political stunt,” state Sen. Melanie Scheible, the bill’s sponsor and member of Nevada’s newly formed LGBTQ+ Caucus, said of the governor’s office. “I’m not trying to give them a bill to veto just so I can complain about it later.”
Some opponents of gender-affirming health care say they’re concerned that young people may undergo certain physical transition procedures that are irreversible or transition socially in settings such as schools without their parents’ knowledge.
Christina Wood applies makeup and gets ready before going to work in her home in Salem, Ore.
Christina Wood stands on the porch of her home in Salem, Ore.
Blue states bolster trans health coverage
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — For most of her life in New Mexico, Christina Wood felt like she had to hide her identity as a transgender woman. So six years ago she moved to Oregon, where she had readier access to the gender-affirming health care she needed to live as her authentic self.
Once there, Wood, 49, was able to receive certain surgeries that helped her transition, but electrolysis, or permanent hair removal, wasn’t fully covered under the state’s Medicaid plan for low-income residents. Paying out-of-pocket ate up nearly half her monthly income, but it was critical for Wood’s mental health.
“Having this facial hair or this body hair, it doesn’t make me feel feminine. I still look in the mirror and I see that masculine person,” she said. “It’s stressful. It causes anxiety and PTSD when you’re having to live in this body that you don’t feel like you should be in.”
Christina Wood shaves before work in her home. (AP Photo/Amanda Loman)
That is likely about to change. Oregon lawmakers are expected to pass a bill that would further expand insurance coverage for gender-affirming care to include things like facial hair removal and Adam’s apple reduction surgery, procedures currently considered cosmetic by insurers but seen as critical to the mental health of transitioning women.
The wide-ranging bill is part of a wave of legislation this year in Democratic-led states intended to carve out safe havens amid a conservative movement that seeks to ban or limit gender-affirming care elsewhere, eliminate some rights and protections for transgender people and even bar discussion of their existence in settings such as classrooms.
RELATED COVERAGE
– Michigan adds LGBTQ protections to anti-discrimination law
More than a half-dozen states, from New Jersey to Vermont to Colorado, have passed or are considering bills or executive orders around transgender health care, civil rights and other legal protections. In Michigan, for example, Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer last month signed a bill outlawing discrimination on the basis of gender identity and sexual orientation for the first time in her state.
“Trans people are just being used as a political punching bag,” said Rose Saxe, deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s LGBT and HIV Project. “Denying this health care doesn’t make them not trans. It just makes their lives much harder.”
Gender-affirming care includes a wide range of social and medical interventions, such as hormone treatments, counseling, puberty blockers and surgery.
Oregon’s bill would bar insurers and the state’s Medicaid plan from defining procedures like electrolysis as cosmetic when they are prescribed as medically necessary for treating gender dysphoria. It also would shield providers and patients from lawsuits originating in states where such procedures are restricted.
“We’re actually very committed to accessibility of coverage. Because you can say something is legal, but if it’s not truly affordable or accessible, that is not a full promise,” said Democratic state Rep. Andrea Valderrama, the bill’s chief sponsor.
Access to procedures such as electrolysis is also necessary as a matter of public safety, said Blair Stenvick, communications manager for the LGBTQ+ advocacy group Basic Rights Oregon.
“Facial hair can be a trigger for harassment,” Stenvick said, and being able to present as a woman “helps folks to not get targeted and identified as a trans person and then attacked.”
The bill has sparked fervent debate, with hundreds of people submitting written testimony both for and against it and an emotionally charged public hearing at the Capitol in Salem last month that went on for several hours. The Democratic-controlled House is expected to vote on the bill Monday over Republican opposition before it heads to the Senate, which is also dominated by Democrats.
Oregon’s measure mirrors a nationwide trend in Democratic-led states.
Shield protections similar to what is being proposed in Oregon have been enacted this year in Colorado, Illinois, New Jersey and New Mexico, and other bills are awaiting the signatures of Govs. Jay Inslee in Washington and Tim Walz in Minnesota. California, Massachusetts and Connecticut passed their own measures last year. They largely bar authorities from complying with subpoenas, arrest warrants or extradition requests from states that have banned gender-affirming treatments.
Meanwhile a measure passed last month by lawmakers in Maryland would expand the list of procedures covered by Medicaid, and Democratic Gov. Wes Moore has said he plans to sign it.
And lawmakers in Nevada’s Democratic-held Legislature are also pushing to expand gender-affirming health care and develop policies regarding the treatment of transgender prisoners, among other things.
The series of bills face an uncertain fate under Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo, who has shied away from the anti-transgender rhetoric and policy proposals that fellow GOP officeholders and candidates across the country have embraced. Lawmakers have just over a month to vote on them before the legislative session ends in June. But regardless of their outcome, an open debate over transgender health care protections in the important swing state promises to further heighten national attention on the issue.
“They know that this is not a political stunt,” state Sen. Melanie Scheible, the bill’s sponsor and member of Nevada’s newly formed LGBTQ+ Caucus, said of the governor’s office. “I’m not trying to give them a bill to veto just so I can complain about it later.”
Some opponents of gender-affirming health care say they’re concerned that young people may undergo certain physical transition procedures that are irreversible or transition socially in settings such as schools without their parents’ knowledge.
Christina Wood applies makeup and gets ready before going to work in her home in Salem, Ore.
(AP Photo/Amanda Loman)
Advocates for gender-affirming health procedures counter that they can be, literally, a matter of life or death.
Kevin Wang, medical director for the LGBTQI+ Program at Swedish Health Services in Seattle, said such care alleviates the depression, anxiety and self-harm seen in patients with gender dysphoria. Studies show that transgender people, particularly youth, consider and attempt suicide at higher rates than the general population.
“These are not aesthetic procedures,” Wang said. “Accessing these services can be absolutely life-saving because we’re preventing future harm.”
Some legal experts, however, warn that laws that protect gender-affirming care but lack strong enforcement mechanisms or funding to investigate violations may not result in meaningful change.
For example, Oregon already bars insurance companies from discrimination on the basis of gender identity. And the state agency overseeing health insurance rules already requires companies to cover procedures deemed medically necessary by a doctor to treat gender dysphoria and bars them from defining them as cosmetic.
But insurers have rarely faced major consequences for violations, said Ezra Young, a civil rights attorney and visiting assistant professor of law at Cornell Law School.
“Where’s the task force that’s going to enforce the law?” Young said. “Where are the lawyers that are going to do this? Where is the funding to educate insurance adjusters that they can’t do this?”
“If you’re leaving it to relatively poor transgender people to litigate a case in court … that’s not a meaningful remedy.”
Advocates for gender-affirming health procedures counter that they can be, literally, a matter of life or death.
Kevin Wang, medical director for the LGBTQI+ Program at Swedish Health Services in Seattle, said such care alleviates the depression, anxiety and self-harm seen in patients with gender dysphoria. Studies show that transgender people, particularly youth, consider and attempt suicide at higher rates than the general population.
“These are not aesthetic procedures,” Wang said. “Accessing these services can be absolutely life-saving because we’re preventing future harm.”
Some legal experts, however, warn that laws that protect gender-affirming care but lack strong enforcement mechanisms or funding to investigate violations may not result in meaningful change.
For example, Oregon already bars insurance companies from discrimination on the basis of gender identity. And the state agency overseeing health insurance rules already requires companies to cover procedures deemed medically necessary by a doctor to treat gender dysphoria and bars them from defining them as cosmetic.
But insurers have rarely faced major consequences for violations, said Ezra Young, a civil rights attorney and visiting assistant professor of law at Cornell Law School.
“Where’s the task force that’s going to enforce the law?” Young said. “Where are the lawyers that are going to do this? Where is the funding to educate insurance adjusters that they can’t do this?”
“If you’re leaving it to relatively poor transgender people to litigate a case in court … that’s not a meaningful remedy.”
Christina Wood stands on the porch of her home in Salem, Ore.
(AP Photo/Amanda Loman)
Christina Wood, the transplant to Oregon, said she was lucky to have had the resources and ability to move to a state where she could more easily complete her transition, compared with other states that have fewer protections.
“It’s scary to live in this world right now. But ... I’m not going to back down, and I’m going to advocate for people in my situation,” Wood said.
“I never had a voice when I was younger. Christopher never had a voice. Christina has a voice. And so that’s what I plan to do.”
___
Associated Press writers Gabe Stern in Carson City, Nevada, Joey Cappellitti in Lansing, Michigan, and Brian Witte in Baltimore contributed to this report.
___
Rush and Stern are corps members for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
Christina Wood, the transplant to Oregon, said she was lucky to have had the resources and ability to move to a state where she could more easily complete her transition, compared with other states that have fewer protections.
“It’s scary to live in this world right now. But ... I’m not going to back down, and I’m going to advocate for people in my situation,” Wood said.
“I never had a voice when I was younger. Christopher never had a voice. Christina has a voice. And so that’s what I plan to do.”
___
Associated Press writers Gabe Stern in Carson City, Nevada, Joey Cappellitti in Lansing, Michigan, and Brian Witte in Baltimore contributed to this report.
___
Rush and Stern are corps members for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
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