Democratic Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards has vetoed a bill that would have protected children from life-altering transgender surgeries and hormone procedures.
Edwards vetoed the “Stop Harming Our Kids Act,” a bill that would have prohibited a wide range of transgender procedures on children, including giving girls who identify as boys double mastectomies. It would also have banned giving children cross-sex hormones and puberty blockers.
“Just as conservative courts have found in Alabama, Florida, Indiana, Kentucky, Arkansas, and Tennessee, I believe that there is no legitimate state interest and no rational basis that justifies harming this very small population of children, their families, and the healthcare who care for them or for the cruel and extreme consequences imposed on children through the overt denial of healthcare by this bill,” Edwards claimed in a letter to Louisiana House Speaker Clay Schexnadyer explaining his veto.
He claimed that the law would be a violation of the 14th Amendment and claimed that lawmakers believing in limited government should not support the bill, which he characterized as part of a “targeted assault on children.”
Despite the governor’s veto, the bill could still have a path forward as there is a supermajority of Republicans in the state’s House and Senate. The bill passed the Senate by a vote of 29-10 and the House by a vote of 75-25.
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A Republican state senator previously held up the bill in committee before it was moved to another committee from where it advanced. Initially, Republican state Senator Fred Mills joined Democrats in a 5-4 vote on the Health and Welfare Committee to block the advancement of the bill. Edwards reportedly pressured lawmakers on the committee to kill the bill.
Roughly 20 states have passed bans on life-altering transgender procedures on children, including Kentucky, which is also governed by a Democrat. The Republican legislature was able to override his veto before portions of the law were just blocked by a federal judge.
The laws have faced an uphill battle, with federal judges in Arkansas, Alabama, Tennessee, Indiana, and Florida blocking portions or all of the bills, largely claiming the legislation could violate the 14th Amendment.
Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti filed a motion for an emergency stay from the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals after U.S. District Judge Eli Richardson placed a temporary injunction on Tennessee’s prohibition of cross-sex hormones and puberty blockers for children, which have been shown to have life-altering impacts.