Welcome back to the show.
And happy Pride Month.
Unfortunately, this year's Pride comes amidst a tidal wave
of Republican attacks on LGBTQ rights,
especially for trans kids.
More than 130 bills targeting transgender rights specifically
were introduced in state legislatures this year.
In Arizona, Governor Doug Ducey signed bills targeting
trans youth, including one that would
restrict access to gender-affirming health care.
We're protecting children from irreversible decisions.
If you believe Republicans who say this is about protecting
kids, I have a bridge those same Republicans
won't pay to fix to sell you.
Making up a fictional threat to rile up the base
is a page straight out of the Republican Party playbook.
And we've seen them do it over and over and over again.
And the ways Republicans are now targeting
trans kids, like in one proposed Ohio bill, are disturbing.
JOURNALIST 1: The proposed rules would
prohibit any trans girl from competing with cisgender girls.
It also has a verification requirement if somebody
is accused of being trans.
If someone is suspected to be trans,
she must go through evaluations of her external and internal
genitalia.
Because nothing says the party of protecting
children like state-mandated inspections of kids' bodies.
While it's very possible the Ohio bill won't go anywhere,
in some states, Republicans have successfully passed laws
that will harm all trans youth.
Alabama became the third state in the nation
to pass a measure restricting gender-affirming care.
But it's the first state to actually
impose criminal penalties.
The law would make providing that care
a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
There's a similar bill being considered in Tennessee that
would also include misdemeanor penalties
against medical providers.
Doctors in Missouri could soon risk losing their license
if they provide hormone treatment
to transgender minors.
JOURNALIST 2: A sweeping new law is
set to take effect in Arkansas in July,
banning doctors from prescribing hormones or puberty blockers.
For the Spurriers, it would have meant
ending testosterone treatments they call life-changing.
Instead, they moved 800 miles west.
That is heartbreaking.
And God forbid they won't need to move again
because as of March 2022, 15 states have either restricted
access to gender-affirming care or at least having
a think over it like a bunch of sick sadistic Winnie the Poohs.
Some of these laws have been blocked by the courts.
But more than 58,000 transgender young people
are at risk of losing access to health care
that every major medical association agrees
is clinically appropriate.
Gender-affirming care includes a range of possible medical
options that range anywhere from fully-reversible puberty
blockers to gender-affirming sex hormones and then,
in some older individuals, perhaps some
gender-confirming surgeries.
There are more than 25 years of published scientific evidence
that support these guidelines.
Their doctors might prescribe them puberty blockers.
So it's a temporary pause on puberty.
What about the argument that you're young, you're teenagers,
and you'll change your mind when you're older.
I would have stopped after the first time someone tried
to beat the shit out of me.
To put into perspective how harmful these laws are,
one expert compared banning gender-affirming care
to removing somebody's cancer treatment
and expecting them to be OK.
I mean, that is [BLEEP]-ed-ed up, unless we're talking about
astrology, in which case, by all means,
stop trying to help cancers.
Everyone born between the days of June 22 to July 22
is a whiny baby.
And that is just science.
In addition to being inhumane and cruel, some of these bands
are just objectively stupid.
Last year, Tennessee passed a completely unnecessary law
banning hormone treatments for prepubescent minors,
even though that isn't actually a thing.
And then there's Texas.
After state legislators failed to pass a law that would have
made providing gender-affirming care to minors a felony,
Governor Greg Abbott ordered Texas Family
and Protective Services to investigate parents
of trans kids for child abuse.
Horrifically, among the first parents investigated
was actually an employee of state protective services
who has a 16-year-old transgender child.
She was placed on administrative leave
and then investigated by her own goddamn co-worker, which
has to be the worst thing someone's done to a colleague
since I used the office microwave to cook fish
and also to kill a man.
There's a reason I was the longest-serving correspondent
on "The Daily Show."
Whether or not Republicans win with these tactics,
queer and trans kids still lose.
2/3 of LGBTQ youth said recent debates over anti-trans laws
have impacted their mental health negatively, including
85% of transgender and/or nonbinary youth,
not to mention that this is a population that's already
at high risk for suicide.
It's hard to, like, live and exist knowing that the majority
of people would, like, commit violence toward you,
I guess, like, if given the chance or just generally
don't support your existence.
WOMAN: Emotionally, physically, this care is life-saving.
The blood of these trans kids is on your hands.
I've met so any young people who've
said that access to health care has saved their lives.
And when we deny that access to health care to trans youth,
we know that there are higher rates of suicide,
higher rates of depression.
So we cannot do this to our children.
If Republicans actually cared about kids,
they'd be expanding access to gender-affirming care,
not banning it.
Fortunately, there are reasons to be hopeful.
LGBTQ activists are fighting back.
And surprisingly, some Republicans
in states like Indiana, Utah, Arizona, and Idaho
have tried to buck the party trend of being
soulless sacks of shit.
But we can't afford to just wait around
and hope that more Republicans will do the right thing.
The stakes are way too high.
So we all need to be in this fight.
We can't afford to let Republicans get away
with dictating trans people's rights over their own bodies
any more than we can let them dictate reproductive rights.
If we don't stand for trans rights,
we don't stand for human rights, period.
We'll be right back.
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