Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene has introduced a bill seeking to outlaw puberty blockers and hormone therapy for children in the US and to punish those providing such treatment with jail time.
Greene, a Republican congresswoman from Georgia, is seeking to ban more than a dozen medical procedures, including surgeries, performed on minors “for the purpose of changing the body of such individual to correspond to a sex that differs from their biological sex.”
Under Greene’s bill, anyone providing treatment of this kind would face up to 25 years in prison. The legislation would also prohibit federal funding for the procedures.
The bill titled ‘Protect Children’s Innocence Act’ has been co-sponsored by 14 House Republicans, according to The Hill news website.
Providing so-called gender-affirming care to minors is “really child abuse,” Greene said on the Fox News show ‘Tucker Carlson Tonight’ on Thursday.
“These kids are too young to make these awful decisions that will affect them and will be permanent for the rest of their lives,” Greene added.
Alabama passed a law this year making it a felony to prescribe puberty blockers and hormones to minors. However, a federal judge blocked certain parts of the law from taking effect in May, ruling that legislators did not provide enough evidence that the transitioning medication prescribed to minors is experimental.
Last year, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommended that the “youth who identify as transgender have access to comprehensive, gender-affirming, and developmentally appropriate health care that is provided in a safe and inclusive clinical space.”