Senator plans to sponsor bill to criminalize sex reassignments for minors

Scott has not finished drafting the bill yet, so it’s impossible to know exactly what the bill’s implications will be.

“It’s an interesting problem, because what you’re talking about there is giving somebody a very profound change in the kind of life they’re gonna lead,” Scott told the Star-Tribune on Monday.

“Before they do something like that, the people do need to have the informed consent of the individual, and a kid does not have the length of experience with life or the degree of maturity to give informed consent.”

Scott said he intends for the bill to include some exceptions for intersex individuals — people born with both male and female biological traits.

He also specified that the bill won’t deal with medical procedures adults choose to receive. “It’s a free country, and they can do what they want,” he said.

Some providers in Wyoming offer certain kinds of gender affirming care for individuals who identify as transgender.

There aren’t any gender affirming surgeons — for youth or for adults — in the state, Kota Babcock, community healthcare organizer for the LGBTQ advocacy organization Wyoming Equality, said in a Tuesday email to the Star-Tribune. Babcock said that gender affirming surgery is generally not an option for minors since it typically changes the body in a way that’s hard to reverse.

Wyoming statute is pretty light on restricting what kind of medical care providers can and can’t give.

That’s partly because people’s understanding of what’s best medical practice can change rapidly, Wyoming Board of Medicine Executive Director Kevin Bohnenblust said.

“What was an accepted medical practice 100 years ago would be totally malpractice now,” he said. “It changes a lot, and it’s always hard to put something in statute and have it stay relevant.”

One recent exception that Bohnenblust and Wyoming Medical Society Executive Director Sheila Bush pointed out is the abortion trigger ban that lawmakers passed last session.

The ban is the subject of a lawsuit now, and its enforcement blocked at least until the legal matter concludes. Plaintiffs contesting the abortion ban’s constitutionality include medical providers who argue that the ban could force them to deny or delay care for pregnant women.

Bush said the Wyoming Medical Society doesn’t have comment on Scott’s bill at this time since the language hasn’t been finalized.

But the society has historically taken a strong stance against legislation that seeks to criminalize certain kinds of medical care.

The upcoming Legislative session will likely see a number of bills dealing with issues around transgender individuals and LGBTQ issues in general.

Sen. Wendy Schuler, R-Evanston, confirmed last week that she plans to bring back a version of last session’s Fairness in Women’s Sports Act. The bill, which cleared the Senate but wasn’t received for introduction in the House, would have barred transgender women and girls from competing on female school sports teams. Schuler told the Star-Tribune on Monday that she plans to tweak the bill so that it’s “a little kinder, gentler.”

Scott voted in favor of the Fairness in Women’s Sports Act during the last session.

During an October event hosted by outgoing State Superintendent of Public Instruction Brian Schroeder, several lawmakers also said they expected more proposed legislation in response to concerns that kids are being “sexualized” in schools.

Those concerns are in large part linked to disapproval around the use of different gender pronouns, books regarding LGBTQ health and sexuality and fears about a speculative “epidemic of people wanting to de-transition,” among other things.

Rep. Rachel Rodriguez-Williams, R-Cody, said at the event that there may be a bill to remove librarians and teachers from the state’s statutory exemptions around obscenity, which are meant to allow the teaching of sexual health topics. Rodriquez-Williams didn’t respond to the Star-Tribune before deadline to confirm whether or not such a bill is in the pipeline for the upcoming Legislative session.

Sen. Cheri Steinmetz, R-Lingle, who also attended the event, said there might be a rerun of her attempt last session to defund the University of Wyoming’s gender studies program. Steinmetz said in a text to the Star-Tribune on Tuesday that it’s “unclear” at this point if she or another lawmaker will sponsor that potential bill.

Wyoming Equality Executive Director and former lawmaker Sara Burlingame lacked optimism when talking with the Star-Tribune on Tuesday about the upcoming Legislative session.

“I think that this incoming body is going to use transgender people in general as their whipping boys,” she said, adding that she believes some lawmakers will do that with “bad intent,” and others “without that intent.”

“But the effect will be the same.”

Scott’s bill will come amid increasing attention on transgender issues in Wyoming and across the nation.

Schroeder, the outgoing state superintendent of public instruction, issued a series of statements through the Wyoming Department of Education over the summer denouncing a federal reinterpretation of anti-discrimination protections meant to add protections for LGBTQ students. Schroeder depicted the change in multiple statements as forcing schools to comply with a federal agenda of “social engineering” in order to continue receiving federal money for school meals.

School board races this year were mired in controversy over books some community members deemed inappropriate for students. Several of those books, which some have called “pornographic,” deal specifically with transgender identities. A number of people who vied for school board seats this year ran in part to oust those books from school libraries.

On Friday, Laramie Faith Community Church elder Todd Schmidt targeted an LGBTQ University of Wyoming student with a sign he set up at the Wyoming Union breezeway stating: “God Created Male and Female and [the student’s name] is a male,” the university’s student paper first reported.

A university official told Schmidt to remove the student’s name, the Star-Tribune previously reported. He complied and was allowed to stay in the building.