Criminal Liability Bill for Parents of Trans Minors Advances in Montana Senate
The legislation passed its first committee on a 6-3 party-line vote
By Mara Silvers for Montana Free Press
Montana Republican lawmakers advanced a bill Wednesday over Democratic opposition that would subject parents and medical providers to criminal penalties if they help transgender minors obtain health care treatments for gender dysphoria.
The legislation, Senate Bill 164, is one of several strategies Republican lawmakers in Montana and other states have advanced in recent years to prohibit transgender minors from receiving medical treatments that help align their appearance with their gender identity.
The effort, widely opposed by transgender people, their families and major U.S. medical organizations, has become a cornerstone of GOP politics in Montana and nationwide.
The current version of the proposed legislation passed by the Senate Judiciary Committee on a 6-3 party-line vote would expand Montana’s child endangerment statute to make an adult criminally liable if the person “knowingly procures or provides” puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones or surgical procedures to youth under the age of 16 “for the purpose of altering the appearance of the child or affirming the child’s perception of the child’s sex when the appearance or perception is inconsistent with the child’s biological sex.”
The bill, sponsored by Senator John Fuller, R-Kalispell, would apply to adults “whether or not the person is supervising the welfare of the child.”
Some of the lawmakers who endorsed the legislation Wednesday said it would help curb the specifically listed medical services for minors who cannot legally consent to health care treatment. They did not reflect on the bill’s repercussions for parents directing other types of medical care for their children.
“I believe that any life-altering decision should not be made by, or to the effect of, a child under 16,” said Senator Sue Vinton, R-Billings.
Senator Cora Neumann, a Bozeman resident and one of three Democrats on the committee, criticized the bill as “bordering on government-sanctioned persecution of a group” and “an attempt to interfere in private matters of families.” She also raised concerns about medical providers deciding to leave the state if such a measure becomes law.
Lawmakers in 2023 passed another bill explicitly prohibiting medical practitioners from providing transition-related health care for youth with gender dysphoria, a diagnosis that only some transgender people receive. That legislation, also sponsored by Fuller, has been blocked from implementation while litigation over its constitutionality continues before a state district court judge in Missoula.
During a Monday bill hearing, one of the proponents of SB 164 said additional legislation was necessary to prevent minors from being treated for gender dysphoria with medical services that can have long-term impacts — a characterization that opponents and several health care experts said was inaccurate.
“Children are not equipped to make life-altering medical decisions with irreversible consequences. The adults who are making these decisions on their behalf must be held accountable under the law,” said Derek Oestreicher, chief legal counsel for the Montana Family Foundation, a conservative Christian policy group.
Oestreicher was one of five proponents who spoke in favor of the legislation compared to 23 opponents, including medical providers, transgender adults and LGBTQ civil rights advocates.
Dr. Anna Louise Peterson, a Montana clinical therapist who said she has treated transgender youth with gender dysphoria, refuted the descriptions of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones as dangerous or experimental. Those treatments are only pursued after extensive decision-making with clients and their families, Peterson said.
“This painstaking process represents the standard of care endorsed by every medical major medical and psychological professional organization in the nation, and it is backed by both extensive clinical experience and rigorous scientific research,” Peterson said. “In all my years working with young people who are experiencing gender dysphoria, I have yet to see a single case in which this treatment protocol has caused any harm to any of my clients. Quite the opposite. It has enabled them to thrive.”
Other opponents cast SB 164 as part of a broader effort to pressure trans people to retreat from the public eye and strip support for trans young people.
“I am a 28-year-old trans woman. I was a trans kid. I know for a fact if I had access to puberty blockers, I would have faced less harassment in my life, and I would have a better self-image today,” said Fae Wilde, one of the people who testified against the bill.
Wilde proposed that lawmakers focus on other quality-of-life issues during their time in Helena, such as housing affordability, instead of pursuing restrictive gender bills.
“Why are our legislators focused on culture war issues? Trans people have always existed in Montana, and we always will. You cannot legislate us back into the closet, into the grave or out of existence,” Wilde said. “We are here and here we will remain.”
Several people who spoke against the bill read letters or made comments on behalf of the parents of trans people in Montana. Many chose not to attend in person, opponents said, out of fear that they would be targeted by law enforcement if the bill were to take effect.
SB 164 will proceed to a debate before the full Senate and must receive majority support across multiple votes in order to advance to the House.
The same Senate committee is scheduled to hear another bill, House Bill 121, on Thursday that affects trans and nonbinary people, as well as those whose appearance doesn’t align with traditional ideas about gender presentation.
That legislation, sponsored by Representative Kerri Seekins-Crowe, R-Billings, would require public and some private facilities to create sex-segregated bathrooms, changing rooms and sleeping areas for multiple users based on a person’s chromosomal makeup and reproductive biology.
Proponents say the measure will help prevent harassment and abuse in vulnerable places by people of different sexes. Opponents contest that the bill will only create confusion, appearance-based profiling and expensive lawsuits for state and local governments.
Under HB 121, facilities that don’t comply, including schools, domestic violence shelters and jails, would be subject to lawsuits brought by individuals.
I wonder how this works in relation to the Montana constitution which makes medical decisions a private matter. It sounds like more performative legislation from the Republicans.
More bizarre Republican obsession with other people's lives, especially around the issues of sex and gender. Too bad they don't put all that time and energy (and taxpayer dollars) into solving issues of real concern to Montanans.