Georgia Senate advances pair of bills to ban gender-transitioning treatment for minors, inmates

Georgia’s Senate passed two bills to ban most gender-transitioning treatment for minors and inmates in state prisons, with some Democrats joining Republicans in supporting the measures.

Lawmakers voted 34-19 on Monday for a bill to ban most gender-transitioning treatments, including puberty blockers, for anyone under the age of 18, even for people already on treatment. In 2023, the state banned most gender-transitioning surgeries and hormone replacement therapies for transgender children unless they were already receiving treatment.

“You’re asking [minors] to make changes that will have changes to the rest of their lives,” GOP Sen. Ben Watson, the bill’s sponsor, said Monday. “It is not a fair decision to them. It is not a fair decision to the parents.”

A second bill — sponsored by Senate Majority Whip Randy Robertson — that would ban most gender-transitioning treatment for inmates in state prisons passed 37-15.

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Opponents of the measures accused Republicans of playing politics by targeting transgender people and argued that lawmakers should focus on more pressing issues. They said both bills infringe on the rights of transgender people and their families to make decisions about gender-transitioning treatment.

“This body has promulgated bill after bill attacking trans people with the ultimate goal of making trans folks disappear. We’ve been here before,” Senate Minority Whip Kim Jackson, a Democrat who is openly lesbian, said Monday.

At least 26 states have enacted laws restricting gender-transitioning treatment for minors, although most have been slapped with lawsuits.

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Jackson and other Democrats proposed an amendment to Watson’s bill that would have allowed minors already receiving gender-transitioning treatment to continue to avoid the medical and emotional risks of stopping in the middle of treatment, but the amendment failed.

Democrat Sens. Elena Parent and Sonya Halpern reaffirmed their commitment to protecting the rights of transgender people but bucked party lines to vote for Robertson’s bill, saying they do not believe taxpayers should be burdened with the cost of gender-transitioning treatment for inmates. Parents proposed an amendment to make an exception for inmates already undergoing hormone replacement therapy, but that amendment also failed.

“I will not let my party be dragged into an argument that makes us look out of touch with the very people we claim to represent,” Halpern said.

Democrat Sen. Sally Harrell, who has two transgender children, said she wanted “to remind people that we are talking about very real people — parents, children, families.”

Sen. Freddie Powell Sims was the lone Democrat who voted for both bills, while four Democrats supported the bill banning gender-transitioning treatment for inmates.

Last month, the Senate passed bills to ban biological boys from playing in girls’ sports and stripped public funding for gender-transitioning treatment for adults. 

The four bills will now head to the House.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.