North Carolina legislature overrides governor’s veto of 3 bills targeting transgender youth – CNN

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The North Carolina legislature’s Republican supermajority voted to override vetoes from the state’s Democratic governor on a slew of bills Wednesday evening, including a trio of measures that target transgender youth.

The House’s and Senate’s override votes, which passed largely along party lines, mean bills that ban gender-affirming care for minors, restrict how gender identity can be discussed in schools, and prohibit transgender athletes from competing on girls’ sports teams are now law in the state.

“These are the wrong priorities, especially when they should be working nights and weekends if necessary to get a budget passed by the end of the month,” Gov. Roy Cooper said, in part, in a statement that addressed the slate of veto overrides.

When Cooper vetoed the three bills pertaining to LGBTQ youth in early July, he accused GOP lawmakers of “scheming for the next election” by “hurting vulnerable children” and pushing “political culture wars.”

Chants of “Protect Trans Kids” echoed through the chamber after the House veto override vote on House Bill 808.

The legislation bans doctors in the state from providing gender-affirming care to minors, even if there is parental consent. Under the new legislation, medical professionals are prohibited from performing surgical gender transition procedures, prescribing puberty-blocking drugs and providing hormone treatments for those under the age of 18, though there are extremely limited exceptions for certain disorders. If a doctor breaks the law, the bill calls for their medical license to be revoked.

The legislation also creates a 25-year window after former patients turn 18 to file civil action against doctors and their employers for perceived damages related to gender-affirming care. The new restrictions would not apply to any child who began treatment before August 1, if a doctor determines their care to be “medically necessary” and they have parental consent.

Gender-affirming care spans a range of evidence-based treatments and approaches that benefit transgender and nonbinary people. The types of care vary by the age and goals of the recipient and are considered the standard of care by many mainstream medical associations.

“Just stop it. You can stop it right now,” state Rep. John Autry said as he asked the House to sustain the governor’s veto. The Mecklenburg County Democrat has spoken throughout the session about his granddaughter, who is transgender.

“When we have an entire group of people who are eight times more likely to commit suicide than their peers, we have a responsibility to make sure those individuals have access to all the health care they need,” said state Rep. Sarah Crawford, a Democrat from Wake County, speaking in opposition to the veto override.

Meanwhile, state Rep. Hugh Blackwell, a Republican from Burke County, argued the legislation “simply says they need to wait until they are 18 to have this kind of procedures,” adding that it was to protect from “irreversible damage.”

This story is breaking and will be updated.