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equality florida
'Huge Win in Florida' as Judge Strikes Down Gender-Affirming Care Ban
"Today's ruling blocks the state of Florida's cruel campaign to deny fundamental rights and basic healthcare to its transgender citizens," said one LGBTQ+ advocate.
Jun 11, 2024
A federal judge on Tuesday ruled that key sections of Florida's ban on gender-affirming healthcare for minors—which also limits adults seeking such care—are unconstitutional and that the Republican state lawmakers and GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis were acting with "anti-transgender animus" and not in the interest of public health when they approved the legislation.
"The state of Florida can regulate as needed but cannot flatly deny transgender individuals safe and effective medical treatment—treatment with medications routinely provided to others with the state's full approval so long as the purpose is not to support the patient's transgender identity," Judge Robert L. Hinkle of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida, Tallahassee Division, wrote in his 105-page opinion.
"Transgender opponents are of course free to hold their beliefs, but they are not free to discriminate against transgender individuals just for being transgender," Hinkle—an appointee of former Democratic President Bill Clinton—continued. "In time, discrimination against transgender individuals will diminish, just as racism and misogyny have diminished."
"To paraphrase a civil rights advocate from an earlier time, the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice," he added, referring to a famous quote by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
Hinkle also struck down a provision of the law forcing adults seeking transition healthcare to meet with a doctor in person before beginning treatment.
One year ago, Hinkle temporarily blocked portions of the law prohibiting doctors from providing, and minors from receiving, so-called "puberty blockers" and other hormonal treatments, calling the proscription "purposeful discrimination" against transgender people.
Civil rights advocates cheered Tuesday's decision.
"Today's ruling striking down Florida's discriminatory restrictions on gender-affirming medical care is a huge victory for the transgender community and for the freedom of all Floridians and their families to make their own private medical decisions," Equality Florida executive director Nadine Smith said in a statement.
"Despite the governor and his rubber-stamp GOP supermajority continuously stripping away our rights, the brave plaintiffs, legal experts, and judges have dealt another powerful blow to DeSantis' agenda of censorship, surveillance, and government intrusion into our personal healthcare decisions," Smith added.
Simone Chriss, director of the Southern Legal Counsel's Transgender Rights Initiative, said in a statement:
The federal court saw Florida's transgender minor healthcare ban and adult restrictions for what they are—discriminatory measures that cannot survive constitutional review. Today's ruling blocks the state of Florida's cruel campaign to deny fundamental rights and basic healthcare to its transgender citizens. We are so proud of our brave plaintiffs, without whom we could not have achieved this victory for the state of Florida.
DeSantis—a failed 2024 GOP presidential candidate who has centered waging what fans and foes alike have called a "war on woke"—signed the gender-affirming care ban into law in May 2023 as part of what one activist condemned as "the most extreme slate of anti-trans laws in modern history."
Among the legislation signed that day were the so-called "Don't Say They" law prohibiting transgender public school students and staff from sharing updated preferred pronouns; S.B. 1438, which bans minors from attending "adult live performances" like drag shows; and H.B. 1521, which empowers cisgender people to order transgender people to leave publicly available restrooms or face criminal trespass charges that could result in up to a year behind bars for refusal to comply.
A spokesperson for DeSantis toldThe New York Times after Tuesday's ruling that "there is no quality evidence to support the chemical and physical mutilation of children."
"These procedures do permanent, life-altering damage to children, and history will look back on this fad in horror," she added.
Lucien Hamel, an adult plaintiff in the case, said Hinkle's ruling brought relief.
"I can't just uproot my family and move across the country," Hamel said in a statement. "The state has no place interfering in people's private medical decisions, and I'm relieved that I can once again get the healthcare that I need here in Florida."
Plaintiff Jane Doe—the mother of 12-year-old transgender girl Susan Doe—asserted that the ruling "means I won't have to watch my daughter needlessly suffer because I can't get her the care she needs."
"Seeing Susan's fear about this ban has been one of the hardest experiences we've endured as parents," she said in a statement. "All we've wanted is to take that fear away and help her continue to be the happy, confident child she is now."
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US Corporate Media Accused of 'Normalizing the Hate Group' Moms for Liberty
"Moms for Liberty is linked with the Proud Boys, a chapter quotes Hitler, they are behind book bans, they are funded by right-wing groups and... ABC News calls them 'joyful warriors,'" wrote one observer. "The whiteness of it all is exhausting."
Jul 03, 2023
ABC News this week joined other U.S. corporate media outlets in being accused of "normalizing" Moms for Liberty after publishing what one critic called a "puff piece" on the right-wing group that's behind a wave of school book bans and is linked to the neofascist Proud Boys and the Qanon conspiracy theory.
On Saturday, ABC News published an article by Brittany Shepherd titled "Moms for Liberty Are Fired Up in Philadelphia" as the self-described "parental rights" organization held its annual conference in Pennsylvania's largest city, where crowds of protesters turned out to denounce the group's bigotry.
"Did ABC let Moms for Liberty write this puff piece themselves?"
"They call themselves joyful warriors—but this group of conservative moms are mad," Shepherd wrote in her lede.
Author and Daily Beast columnist Wajahat Ali called the article "shameful."
"Moms for Liberty is linked with the Proud Boys, a chapter quotes Hitler, they are behind book bans, they are funded by right-wing groups and... ABC News calls them 'joyful warriors,'" Ali tweeted. "The whiteness of it all is exhausting."
Historian Kevin Kruse wondered, "Did ABC let Moms for Liberty write this puff piece themselves?"
Brandon Wolf, press secretary for the LGBTQ+ advocacy group Equality Florida, noted that a Moms for Liberty chapter in Indiana included a quote from Adolf Hitler in its inaugural newsletter. The chapter chairperson subsequently apologized.
Founded in Florida in 2021 to oppose Covid-19 lockdowns and mandates, Moms for Liberty quickly gained a reputation for its anti-LGBTQ views and its harassment of school officials in service of the organization's far-right agenda.
The group—which says it has more than 115,000 members in 245 chapters in 45 states—wants to erase mention of LGBTQ+ rights, systemic racism, diversity, and other "woke" topics from school curricula.
Moms for Liberty—many of whose chapters are linked to extremist groups like the Proud Boys and Three Percenters as well as the Qanon conspiracy theory—has spearheaded a successful movement to ban books, especially ones with LGBTQ+ and racial themes, from school libraries across the nation.
The American Library Association said earlier this year that it had recorded 1,269 demands to censor books from various groups and individuals in 2022, compared to 729 challenges counted in 2021.
In her article, Shepherd wrote how the Moms for Liberty conference "showcases how local issues like education can have tremendous, galvanizing national influence, as Gov. Ron DeSantis, former President Donald Trump, and former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley tried to woo nearly 700 attendees."
The article continued:
Several key breakout sessions at the center of the group's mission, such as "Protecting Kids from Gender Ideology" and "Getting Flipped School Boards To Take Action" were kept behind closed doors, with media access barred. But still, the enthusiasm at open events was palpable, nearly bouncing off the ballroom walls.
The piece does note that Moms for Liberty is designated an extremist group by the Southern Poverty Law Center for spreading "hateful imagery and rhetoric against the LGBTQ community."
However, two paragraphs later Shepherd wrote that "Republicans will need this group to make up any lost ground" from last year's midterm elections.
In a Friday interview by MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace, extremism expert Kristofer Goldsmith urged viewers to spread the world about who Moms for Liberty are and what they stand for.
"We are talking book burning. We're talking about racism and we're talking about persecuting the LGBTQ community. These are the Proud Boys with a wig and lipstick," Goldsmith said. "That is all that they are. And because of the words 'Moms for Liberty,' not a lot of people are going to understand that."
"So folks watching this need to be evangelists, right?" he added. "You need to get out online and talk to your friends about what Moms for Liberty is, and help them understand that they are a pipeline into the most radical of extremism in this country."
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DeSantis Signs 'Most Extreme Slate of Anti-Trans Laws in Modern History'
"The nation should be on high alert. We are all Floridians as DeSantis seeks to export this blueprint of authoritarianism to the rest of the country," warned one activist in anticipation of the governor's likely presidential run.
May 17, 2023
Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Wednesday signed a bundle of bills targeting transgender people that one activist condemned as "the most extreme slate of anti-trans laws in modern history."
Surrounded by children at Cambridge Christian School in Tampa, DeSantis—a likely 2024 Republican presidential candidate—signed H.B. 1069, which expands the so-called "Don't Say Gay or Trans" law to prohibit educators from discussing sexual orientation or gender identity in grades K-12.
Also sometimes called the "Don't Say They" law, the legislation prohibits transgender students and staff from sharing updated preferred pronouns with each other.
\u201cDeSantis just signed the most extreme slate of anti-trans laws in modern history.\n\nA bathroom ban will result in many arrests in months to come.\n\nA care ban targets 80% of adult care.\n\nThey are getting little coverage.\n\nSubscribe to support my work.\n\nhttps://t.co/njmIfLHKcy\u201d— Erin Reed (@Erin Reed) 1684342317
DeSantis also signed S.B. 254, which bans gender-affirming care—which many trans people and doctors have called "lifesaving"—for minors, while prohibiting nurse practitioners from providing such healthcare to adults. Physicians who violate the law are subject to criminal charges.
Meanwhile, adults seeking gender-affirming care must obtain written permission from the Board of Medicine and Board of Osteopathic Medicine—whose members are appointed by the governor and have been inimical to transgender healthcare.
The law also grants state courts the power to seize children "if the child has been subjected to or is threatened with being subjected to sex-reassignment prescriptions or procedures."
Dr. Marci Bowers, president of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health, said in a statement that S.B 254 "has created a chilling effect on the medical community by inserting politics into healthcare."
"Let me be clear, the medical community is united in endorsing gender-affirming care as safe, effective, and necessary care," she asserted. "Healthcare providers follow best practices based on science and research, and there's no place for misinformation or extreme ideology in our work."
"Florida politicians are acting in direct contradiction to decades of research that show the mental and physical health benefits of gender-affirming care," Bowers added. "Decisions about healthcare, including gender-affirming care, must remain between a healthcare provider and their patient, without political interference."
\u201cRon DeSantis just signed into law a GOP-backed ban on medical care for transgender youth.\n\nDeSantis and Florida Republicans went a step further, also requiring transgender ADULTS to obtain written consent from two oversight boards whose members are appointed by DeSantis.\u201d— Kyle Griffin (@Kyle Griffin) 1684345823
Another bill signed by DeSantis, S.B. 1438, bans minors from attending "adult live performances" like drag shows. The measure has led to the cancellation or scaling back of events including Treasure Coast Pridefest in Port St. Lucie.
"The most troubling bill, though," wrote activist Erin Reed, "is a ban on transgender people in bathrooms that comes with criminal charges and jail sentences."
The law, H.B. 1521, empowers cisgender people to order transgender people to leave publicly available restrooms—in places including airports, sports arenas, convention centers, beaches, parks, and public and even private healthcare and educational institutions—or face criminal trespass charges that could result in up to a year behind bars for those who refuse to comply. Transgender people in Florida are likely to be jailed in facilities that don't match their gender identity, exposing them to serious risk of sexual assault and other crimes.
\u201cEven if you are not travelling to Florida you may be affected. Tampa, Orlando, and Miami international airports are among the busiest in the country and they would be subject to the bathroom ban. If you stop for a layover in an airport, you could be affected by this.\u201d— Alejandra Caraballo (@Alejandra Caraballo) 1684342548
Reed said the law "will effectively give second-class citizen status to transgender people in Florida."
Other critics pointed to recent incidents in which trans people have been harassed while using restrooms.
\u201cTransphobia eventually becomes this: harassing random strangers in the bathroom and getting yourself heated bc you believe, from your visual observation, that it's possible to know someone's gender just by looking at them.\u201d— Gabrielle Alexa Noel \ud83d\udc98 (@Gabrielle Alexa Noel \ud83d\udc98) 1683741412
During Wednesday's signing ceremony, DeSantis proclaimed, "What we've said in Florida is we are going to remain a refuge of sanity and a citadel of normalcy."
However, LGBTQ+ advocates condemned the new laws.
"This is an all-out attack on freedom," said Joe Saunders, senior political director at Equality Florida, refuting DeSantis' claim that he governors "the freest state" in the nation.
"Free states don't strip parents of the right to make healthcare decisions for their children. Free states don't ban books, censor curriculum, or muzzle free speech," Saunders continued. "DeSantis doesn't see freedom as a value worth defending, he sees it as a campaign slogan in his bid for the White House. And he is setting freedom—and Florida's reputation—ablaze in his desperation to win the GOP nomination."
\u201cSo - in #Florida, asking someone to wear a flimsy mask to possibly reduce the severity of a pandemic was a gross assault on personal freedoms. Banning medical care due to uninformed bigotry is A-OK. Right. Got it. #bullshit https://t.co/uJh2HBMva8\u201d— Ed the Sock (@Ed the Sock) 1684352280
"The nation should be on high alert," Saunders added. "We are all Floridians as DeSantis seeks to export this blueprint of authoritarianism to the rest of the country."
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