Governor bans transgender surgery on minors - but skeptics ask: 'What about chemical castration?'

Republican Governor Mike DeWine of Ohio signed an executive order on Friday that has banned the performance of transgender transition surgeries on minors. The controversial move from DeWine came just a week after he issued a veto to Ohio's House Bill 68 which was designed to ban the same surgeries but also would require any school, college, or university sports teams to be single-sex.

According to The Center Square, DeWine explained his actions saying, “A week has gone by, and I still feel as firmly about that as I did that day. I believe parents rather than government should be making those important medical decisions.”

He added, "This is something that the entire time when I talked to families, not once did they mention they want to have surgery on their minor child. That was never mentioned. This just assures everybody that that will never happen."

The outlet noted that the order from DeWine and the rules proposed for "transgender health care for adults and children" were the only items that DeWine addressed Friday. He told the press that under the new rules up for comment with the Ohio Department of Health and the Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction the state would put a stop to what he termed “fly-by-night” providers of the transgender procedures.

The new rules require "multi-disciplinary teams at hospitals to provide support care, including psychiatrists and a comprehensive plan of the risks associated with the treatment and required mental health counseling," according to the outlet.

In the text of Executive Order 2024-01D DeWine wrote, "although I vetoed Substitute House Bill 68, I stated clearly in my Veto Message that I agreed with the General Assembly that no gender transition surgeries should be performed on anyone under the age of 18 and I directed agencies under my purview to draft rules to ban this practice in Ohio."



The Ohio governor told reporters, "I’m doing it because it’s important that we do it. When I really started looking at this, these were some holes that need to be filled. One, we needed data. We don’t have data on this. Whatever the Legislature does, we’re going through with this. I spent time looking at this and talking to people, and it’s clear the most important thing with this is mental health counseling. It needs to be lengthy, and it needs to be comprehensive.”

Conservative commentator Matt Walsh of The Daily Wire expressed his doubts of DeWine though with the observation, "DeWine is trying to find an incoherent compromise position by banning surgeries but still allowing chemical castration of children. Not nearly good enough. His veto must be overridden and he should still be run out of Republican politics forever."
 
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