America&#8217;s most influential psychological association told The Daily Wire it still recommends children receive so-called gender affirming medical interventions, despite downplaying its support of child transgenderism in a letter to government <a href="https://www.ftc.gov/about-ftc/commissioners-staff/commissioners" target="_blank" rel="noopener">officials</a><a href="https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/chairman-ferguson-gender-affirming-care-workshop-speech.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> investigating</a> fraud in pediatric gender medicine.
The American Psychological Association (APA) confirmed in a written statement that it continues to &#8220;support treatments for minors seeking gender affirming care&#8221; in alignment with its 2024 <a href="https://www.apa.org/about/policy/transgender-nonbinary-inclusive-care.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">policy statement,</a> which endorses minors receiving harmful gender medical interventions, condemns state laws banning child sex-changes, and says &#8220;non-affirmation&#8221; of a child&#8217;s transgender identity can cause &#8220;significant harm.&#8221;
In a September 2025 <a href="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/03/American-Psychological-Assocation-Response-to-FTC-RFI_Gender-Affirming-Care-9-26-2025_Signature.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">letter</a> to the Federal Trade Commission — which is actively investigating <a href="https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2025/06/ftc-announces-workshop-exploring-unfair-or-deceptive-trade-practices-gender-affirming-care-minors#:~:text=Home-,FTC%20Announces%20Workshop%20on%20Exploring%20Unfair%20or%20Deceptive%20Trade%20Practices,whistleblowers%2C%20detransitioners%2C%20and%20parents.&amp;text=Tags:,Health%20Care" target="_blank" rel="noopener">unfair and deceptive</a> practices within the field of pediatric &#8220;gender affirming care&#8221; — the APA downplayed its support of &#8220;gender affirming care,&#8221; stating the primary role of a therapist treating children with gender dysphoria is assessment, not affirmation.
&#8220;It is important to stress that during the assessment and evaluation process, a diagnosis of gender dysphoria or the identification of a youth as gender-questioning is not an automatic or singular pathway to medical intervention or even social transitioning,&#8221; the letter reads.
This statement contradicts the idea that &#8220;non-affirmation&#8221; poses a direct harm to children, as included in the 2024 policy.
Kurt Miceli, the chief medical officer at Do No Harm, says the APA wants to &#8220;have it both ways.&#8221;
&#8220;The American Psychological Association continues its attempt at having it both ways,&#8221; Miceli told The Daily Wire. &#8220;In its 2024 Policy Statement, the APA explicitly endorses &#8216;medical gender‑affirming care,&#8217; even urging insurers to cover these interventions for minors.&#8221;
The APA told The Daily Wire the &#8220;2024 policy statement and the FTC letter are consistent&#8221; and that &#8220;both documents reflect APA&#8217;s consistent commitment to evidence-based psychological care.&#8221;
The APA is the latest medical group to try to shed its reputation for radical transgender ideology. When President Donald Trump returned to office, his administration purged gender ideology from the government and launched investigations into practices within pediatric gender medicine. Since then, gender clinics <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hospitals-across-u-s-stop-transitioning-children-after-trump-signs-order-protecting-kids">across the country</a> have closed their doors, while the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/this-fight-is-not-over-major-medical-org-rejects-transgender-surgeries-for-kids">American Society of Plastic Surgery</a> has backed away from supporting sex-rejecting procedures for minors.
&#8220;The APA’s 2024 and 2025 statements cannot be reconciled,&#8221; Miceli told The Daily Wire. &#8220;It is an audacious contradiction for the APA to try to claim that their definition of ‘affirming care’ means anything other than sex-rejecting interventions.&#8221;
The Daily Wire asked the APA how it simultaneously viewed the &#8220;non-affirmation&#8221; of a child&#8217;s gender identity as causing &#8220;significant harm&#8221; while recommending a psychologist&#8217;s role is to assess, rather than affirm, a child&#8217;s gender confusion. The Daily Wire also asked for clarity on what clinical standards the APA recommends to help therapists determine when non-affirmation of gender identity is harmful versus when it&#8217;s an appropriate part of a clinical assessment.
The APA did not provide a straightforward answer to these questions, but said, &#8220;In APA’s professional framework, affirming care does not mean a predetermined outcome, automatic validation of any particular intervention, or bypassing clinical judgment.&#8221;
The Daily Wire asked the APA if a therapist should withhold using a child&#8217;s preferred pronouns — a form of &#8220;social transition&#8221; — until the child undergoes an extensive assessment.
&#8220;Affirmation and assessment work together,&#8221; the APA told The Daily Wire. &#8220;Supporting a child does not mean steering them toward any particular outcome, and neither a diagnosis nor a youth’s questions about gender automatically lead to social or medical transition.&#8221;
The APA also said it &#8220;cautions that equating gender‑affirming care solely with medical transition can stigmatize and limit access to essential mental health services.&#8221;
With more than<a href="https://www.apa.org/about" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> 190,000 members</a> nationwide, the APA has a far-reaching impact on the psychological field and the practice of therapy throughout the United States. The APA has received more than 20 million dollars in federal funding since 2020, according to a government transparency <a href="https://taggs.hhs.gov/Detail/RecipDetail?arg_EntityId=EiNnLpTBhhCS2ZCRaSuz3Q%3D%3D">website</a>.

Pride Flags Above Regent Street In London

Your Therapist Is Being Told To ‘Affirm’ Child Transgenderism

American Psychological Association

gender ideology

Transgender

When the European Union adopted the Digital Services Act (DSA), officials insisted that the sweeping regulation was necessary to tackle “illegal content,” “disinformation,” and other harmful online activity. The message was that responsible regulation would make the internet a safer place. The reality, however, is that the DSA grants the EU enormous <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/how-europe-plans-to-strangle-american-free-speech?author=Lorcan+Price&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=undefined&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=How+Europe+Plans+To+Strangle+American+Free+Speech">censorship powers</a> that endanger free speech in the digital public square, in Europe and across the world.
Now, for anyone wondering what kind of speech these powers might ultimately be used to suppress, the answer is becoming clearer. On March 5, the European Commission adopted its new <a href="https://commission.europa.eu/strategy-and-policy/policies/justice-and-fundamental-rights/gender-equality/gender-equality-strategy_en">Gender Equality Strategy</a>. The document leaves no doubt about the EU’s highly ideological direction, which has positioned it to become the world’s online censor through the DSA.
In the strategy, the European Commission states plainly that the DSA “recognises gender-based violence as a systemic risk, which providers of very large online platforms… have to assess and mitigate”. But what exactly is “gender-based violence”? 
According to the Commission, “online violence” includes acts that cause “psychological” harm or “suffering to women”. What this means is that if the ideological NGOs tasked with patrolling online content under the DSA object to a social media post on the grounds that it is “likely” to cause “harm” to women, major online platforms like X and Meta would be pressured to remove it as “violence”.
The nebulous definition of “online violence” put forward by the new Gender Equality Strategy makes it little more than a vehicle for digital censorship. The strategy presents itself as a roadmap for advancing equality across Europe. Yet what it reveals is a metastatic, habitual tendency on the part of EU institutions to embed contested ideological positions into policy and then frame any dissent as a threat. 
One notable passage in the strategy frames opposition to gender ideology as dangerous, warning that “anti-gender narratives … threaten the EU’s democratic space”. The strategy explicitly identifies “<a href="https://commission.europa.eu/document/download/1f5fa936-9fba-4435-93f5-32fa220bac82_en?filename=gender-equality-strategy-2026-2030.pdf">LBTIQ+</a> women” as a protected group and links gender equality efforts with other EU initiatives focused on sexual orientation. It also adopts an “intersectional approach,” asserting that sex and gender intersect with multiple forms of discrimination and should therefore be addressed through overlapping identity-based policies.
The strategy explicitly supports so-called “sexual and reproductive health and rights,” referencing a recent pro-abortion European Citizens Initiative. This signals continued normalization and support for abortion access on the part of the EU, which it has no authority to promote.
In the strategy, the European Commission refers to the Neil Datta report <a href="https://www.epfweb.org/node/1144">&#8220;The Next Wave&#8221;</a> as a trustworthy study identifying “well-resourced global movements, and increasingly exploited through foreign information manipulation and interference”. But what this “report” does is identify <a href="https://www.epfweb.org/node/1152">pro-life NGOs</a> and research centers promoting biological reality as radical, anti-gender, conservative, and religious extremists.
It does not take much imagination to see how this framework could be deployed in the world of online censorship.
In place since February 2024, the DSA gives the European Commission unprecedented power over the world’s largest online platforms, requiring them to remove certain content and manage “systemic risks” on their services. When authorities view legitimate criticism of gender ideology as part of “anti-gender narratives” threatening democracy, the next evident step is censorship in the name of “content moderation”.
Consider the prosecution of Finnish Member of Parliament <a href="https://adfinternational.org/campaign/free-speech-on-trial">Päivi Räsänen</a> under Finland’s national “hate speech” law. With the legal support of ADF International, Räsänen, a medical doctor, grandmother, and parliamentarian since 1995, has spent more than six years defending herself against criminal charges for posting a Bible verse on Twitter in 2019. She posted the verse to support her Christian beliefs about marriage and sexuality. Despite being acquitted twice by Finnish courts, the state prosecution has relentlessly pursued the case, which now awaits a decision from Finland’s Supreme Court. Under the DSA, we should expect to see more aggressive censorship for the simple expression of traditional Christian views like Räsänen&#8217;s.
Of course, the EU can, and should, advance authentic policies to promote equality between the sexes. But this is not that. There is no doubt that the Gender Equality Strategy strengthens the censorship regime created by the DSA. Democratic societies depend on open debate to promote true equality, not the suppression of views that challenge elite orthodoxy.
Platforms that fail to comply with DSA censorship directives face enormous fines, as evidenced by the €120 million fine levied against X, an American platform, last December. Although the penalty was formally tied to procedural violations, the platform was targeted for its pro-free speech stance, which it is now <a href="https://adfinternational.org/news/x-challenges-e120m-fine-under-eu-censorship-law">appealing</a> before the Court of Justice of the EU.
Both in Europe and across the world, including in the United States, the DSA creates powerful incentives for platforms to remove lawful content subjectively deemed problematic or suffer the consequences, which can range from crippling fines to suspension of services.
Europe has long presented itself as a defender of fundamental rights and democratic values. Yet the trajectory of its speech policies increasingly points in the opposite direction. Make no mistake about it: the EU is coming for your free speech, regardless of where you live, and it’s taking no pains to hide the kind of speech it’s after.
* * *
Dr. Adina Portaru is senior counsel, Europe, for legal advocacy organization ADF International, which is supporting X’s legal challenge before the General Court of the EU.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Symbol of transgender and female and male gender symbols

The EU’s Censorship Regime Has A New Gender Strategy And It Threatens Free Speech Everywhere

The EU's Censorship Regime Has A New Gender Strategy And It Threatens Free Speech Everywhere

Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF)

Europe

European Union

Gender

Alabama Attorney General Stephen Marshall is leading a coalition of 20 states demanding the American Medical Association halt its support of hormonal therapies as treatment for gender dysphoria in children, after the organization withdrew support for child sex-rejecting surgeries.
“We thus find it concerning that the AMA continues to support the use of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to treat gender dysphoria in minors,” the attorneys general wrote in a letter to AMA President John Whyte. “The quality of evidence is the same as it is for surgeries: low and very-low quality.”
&#8220;The American Medical Association has finally admitted what many have warned for years: its recommendations for surgeries on children were not grounded in solid evidence, despite telling doctors and families otherwise,” Attorney General Marshall told The Daily Wire. “Yet the same weak science underpins puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones. You cannot dismiss one intervention as unsupported while continuing to push the rest. When children&#8217;s lives and futures are at stake, anything less than full scientific honesty is reckless. The AMA must follow the science completely, not selectively.&#8221; 

Marshall warned the AMA’s inconsistencies could be misleading the public and violate Alabama’s consumer protection laws, which state it is unlawful for an organization to represent that “goods or services” have “uses, benefits, or qualities that they do not have,” according to the letter. 
“We remain concerned that providers, patients, and their families in our States are being confused or misled by the AMA regarding the safety and efficacy of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to treat gender dysphoria in minors,” the letter says.
To avoid a “formal investigation” Marshall asked the AMA to answer a series of questions meant to clarify its position on the use of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones as treatment for pediatric gender dysphoria, within 30 days.  
“While we hope to avoid a formal investigation under our consumer protection laws, we do have concerns that the AMA may be violating those laws,” the letter says.
The AMA recently told the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/04/health/gender-surgery-minors-ama.html">New York Times</a> and other news <a href="https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/quality/patient-safety-outcomes/ama-alters-position-on-gender-affirming-surgeries-for-minors/">outlets</a> that “surgical interventions in minors should be generally deferred to adulthood” due to the absence of “clear evidence&#8221; supporting their use. 
“If you agree that there is insufficient evidence to support using surgical interventions to treat gender dysphoria in minors — as your recent statement indicates — we do not understand how you can find that there is sufficient evidence to support using hormonal interventions to treat gender dysphoria in minors,” Marshall writes in the letter.  
“These interventions have not been shown to be any safer for children than sex-change surgeries are, and in fact may be all the more dangerous precisely because they are viewed as not as serious. But hormones can leave a child sterilized just as surely as surgery can,” the letter states. 
The AMA’s turnabout came shortly after the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) published a February 3 <a href="https://www.plasticsurgery.org/documents/health-policy/positions/2026-gender-surgery-children-adolescents.pdf">position statement</a> recommending “surgeons delay gender-related breast/chest, genital, and facial surgery until a patient is at least 19 years old,” after reviewing available evidence. The ASPS also pointed out in the statement there is &#8220;substantial uncertainty” of the “long-term benefits and harms” of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones. 
Marshall successfully <a href="https://www.alabamaag.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/2025.5.1-Attorney-General-Steve-Marshall-Announces-Victory-in-Defense-of-Alabamas-Law-Prohibiting-Sex-Change-Procedures-for-Minors.pdf">defended</a> Alabama’s law banning sex-rejecting procedures for minors during Boe v. Marshall and through litigation discovered hundreds of pages of documents revealing the political forces informing transgender medicine. This included emails showing former Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services Richard “Rachel” Levine <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/biden-admins-rachel-levine-met-with-wpath-as-he-pushed-for-removal-of-trans-surgery-age-restrictions?author=Spencer+Lindquist&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=undefined&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Biden+Admin%E2%80%99s+Rachel+Levine+Met+With+WPATH+As+He+Pushed+For+Removal+Of+Trans+Surgery+Age+Restrictions">controversially</a> <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trans-identifying-biden-official-allegedly-behind-push-to-ditch-age-guidelines-for-transgender-procedures-docs-show?author=Virginia+Kruta&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=undefined&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Trans-Identifying+Biden+Official+Allegedly+Behind+Push+To+Ditch+Age+Guidelines+For+Transgender+Procedures%3A+Docs+Show">pressured</a> the World Professional Association of Transgender Health (WPATH) into removing gender surgery age minimums from its clinical guidance, called the Standards of Care Version 8.
WPATH’s clinical guideline, which recommends children receive puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries, has been discredited and heavily criticized for lacking scientific rigor.
A 2025 <a href="https://opa.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/2025-11/gender-dysphoria-report.pdf">report</a> from the Department of Health and Human Services on the treatment of pediatric gender dysphoria said the WPATH guidelines were “rated among the lowest in quality” and “have not been recommended for implementation by systematic reviews (SRs) of guidelines.” 
“Despite their lack of trustworthiness, for more than a decade WPATH guidelines have served as the foundation of the healthcare infrastructure for gender dysphoric (GD) youth in the United States,” states the report. 
Marshall views the AMA’s recognition of a lack of evidence to support child sex-change surgeries as a “tacit acknowledgement” that WPATH’s standards are not &#8220;evidence-based,” according to the letter. 
The letter asks the AMA if it views the WPATH guidelines as “evidence-based, reliable, and consistent with the best practices of evidence- based medicine.”
The letter was signed by attorneys general from Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, and West Virginia.
“We know that we share a common goal in wanting to protect patients and their families and ensure that they receive trustworthy information about their medical care,” the letter reads.
The AMA did not immediately respond to The Daily Wire’s request for comment.

Transgender Rights Advocates Rally Against The Supreme Court’s Ban On Gender-Affirming Youth Care

Medical Giant Retreats On Trans Kid Surgeries — But Stops Short Of Full Reversal

Alabama

American Medical Association

A liberal Maryland county will shell out $1.5 million to a group of religious parents who sued the school board over a policy that blocked parents from opting their children out of instruction on books pushing transgender ideology.  
In addition to paying damages, the board of education for Montgomery County must inform parents whenever there will be instruction related to family life and human sexuality. The <a href="https://becketnewsite.s3.amazonaws.com/20260219151333/Consent-Judgment-in-Mahmoud-v-Taylor.pdf">settlement</a> comes after a group of parents from various religious backgrounds won a major victory at the Supreme Court that <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/supreme-court-sides-with-parents-says-schools-cant-mandate-lgbt-curricula">struck down</a> the county’s opt-out policies as unconstitutional. 
The settlement was announced on Friday by Becket, a non-profit law firm focused on litigation issues related to religious liberty. It was approved by Judge Deborah Boardman in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland. 
“Public schools nationwide are on notice: running roughshod over parental rights and religious freedom isn’t just illegal — it’s costly,” said Eric Baxter, senior counsel at Becket and lead attorney for the parents. “This settlement enforces the Supreme Court’s ruling and ensures parents, not government bureaucrats, have the final say in how their children are raised.” 
Montgomery County is a heavily Democratic area that borders Washington, D.C. 
In June 2025, the Supreme Court <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/supreme-court-sides-with-parents-says-schools-cant-mandate-lgbt-curricula">ruled 6-3</a> in favor of the parents against the county, with Justice Samuel Alito writing the majority opinion. 
“A government burdens the religious exercise of parents when it requires them to submit their children to instruction that poses ‘a very real threat of undermining’ the religious beliefs and practices that the parents wish to instill,” Alito wrote.
The legal battle first began in March 2023, when the school board said that it would no longer let parents opt out of books pushing transgender and queer ideology. In response, a group of Christian, Muslim, and Jewish parents challenged the county in Mahmoud v. Taylor.
“It took tremendous courage for these parents to stand up to the School Board and take their case all the way to the Supreme Court,” Baxter said. “Their victory reshaped the law and ensured that generations of religious parents will be able to guide their children’s upbringing according to their faith.”
Chris Persak, a Catholic father whose children attend Montgomery County schools, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/caught-in-a-scotus-clash-over-trans-ideology-parents-turned-to-faith-and-the-constitution">previously told</a> The Daily Wire it was his faith that helped him stay calm throughout the whole legal process. 
“We said prayers of the Holy Spirit, and just felt this unbelievable calmness as we’re walking in,” he said. “Even with the protesters, even with members of the leadership of Montgomery County, who were protesting against us live that day.”

Supreme Court Hears Arguments On Parental Rights Regarding LGBTQ Books In Schools

Liberal County Took On Religious Parents — Now They’re Paying For It

Liberal County Must Pay Parents After Losing SCOTUS Case On Trans Ideology

Education

Maryland

Montgomery County

We are now witnessing a massive cultural retreat from the most controversial elements of activist-driven gender ideology aimed at children. And corporate America is a major part of that shift.
For years, the gender ideology narrative captured our society’s most prominent institutions. The notion that the provision of hormone regimens, puberty blockers, and gender transition surgeries was the only compassionate response to young people facing confusion about their gender morphed from a fringe theory into a near-unquestionable dictate during the last decade. In 2019, a doctor who believed in the Biblical and scientific notion of differences between the sexes was<a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-birmingham-49904997"> told</a> that his views were “incompatible with human dignity.” Parents of children struggling with gender dysphoria were often <a href="https://www.centerforbiblicalunity.com/post/would-you-rather-have-a-dead-daughter-or-a-live-son">presented</a> with a ghoulish, faux-paternalistic ultimatum by therapists and psychologists: “Would you rather have a dead daughter or a live son?”
Perhaps the most impactful driver of this narrative was the boardroom. The dictates of gender ideology were not only pushed forward by activists but also supported by some of the most recognizable brands on Earth. One of the most high-profile examples was Amazon: scholar Ryan T. Anderson, whose 2018 book When Harry Became Sally offered a thoughtful Christian response to gender ideology, had to fight through a <a href="https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/company-news/amazon-statement-on-when-harry-became-sally">book ban</a> and <a href="https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/company-news/amazon-statement-on-when-harry-became-sally">smears</a> of “hate speech,” before it could be sold in the world’s largest online market. Countless companies, from Apple to Target, were <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/how-left-wing-activists-are-trying-to-save-corporate-wokeness">participating</a> with corporate activist organizations like the Human Rights Campaign, one of the major promoters of gender ideology in corporate America.
In the 2010s and early 2020s, it was perfectly reasonable to believe that the way major companies handled gender ideology was less about science and more about <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/corporations-that-pushed-gender-ideology-owe-america-an-explanation?author=Isaac+Willour&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=8&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Corporations+That+Pushed+Gender+Ideology+Owe+America+An+Explanation">placating</a> goalpost-shifting activists. And then, as so often happens with activist movements, the goalposts got shifted too far. It wasn’t just adult choice that was the focus of gender ideology. It was about the attempted normalization of surgical interventions for children. That was when the momentum shifted.
Three recent occurrences illustrate just how quickly the tide is turning.
First, a 22-year-old ‘detransitioner’ — someone who regrets their gender transition — just <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/this-court-case-has-gotten-little-attention-but-just-changed-everything">won</a> a $2 million lawsuit against the New York doctors who approved her surgery. Fox Varian, who had a double mastectomy (surgical removal of both breasts) when she was just 16 years old, is the first detransitioner to take a medical malpractice case to trial and win.
That ruling came on January 30. On February 3, the American Society of Plastic Surgeons <a href="https://www.plasticsurgery.org/for-medical-professionals/health-policy/position-statements">released</a> a statement asserting that “there is insufficient evidence demonstrating a favorable risk-benefit ratio for … gender-related endocrine and surgical interventions in children and adolescents.” 
Days later, the American Medical Association <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/04/health/gender-surgery-minors-ama.html">announced</a> its agreement: “The AMA agrees… surgical interventions in minors should be generally deferred to adulthood.”
Let’s be clear about what that means: in the span of approximately a week, two absolutely critical points have been proven about gender ideology: (1) performing gender transition surgeries on children is a source of major legal liability, and (2) the medical consensus does not neatly support the necessity of such treatments.
These are precisely the arguments we have made to companies for years about their healthcare coverage. For companies that spent the early 2020s placating activists pushing gender ideology, the mid 2020s may be a painful reckoning with how out-of-touch with reality those activists truly were.
Activist groups like the Human Rights Campaign <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/the-radical-intolerance-behind-woke-corporate-activism?author=Isaac+Willour&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=11&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=The+Radical+Intolerance+Behind+Woke+Corporate+Activism">told</a> companies that covering hormone regimens and transition care were prudent ways to minimize risk. It’s incredibly apparent that this was a wild guess at best, and a cleverly worded activist ploy at worst. As the era of corporate wokeness comes to an end, companies seeking to stay politically neutral and avoid becoming entrenched in culture war issues (remember, companies have a fiduciary duty to do this) are taking a serious look at their healthcare coverage.
For companies that cover gender transition care for adults, do they also cover detransition care? If not, that hardly reads as politically neutral. Do companies have clear stances on not covering gender transition care for children? These are the questions that we, as corporate engagement professionals, are asking hundreds of companies.
Some companies are setting the standard. Walmart, the world’s largest company, <a href="https://me.walmart.com/content/dam/themepage/pdfs/AssociateBenefitsBook-2026.pdf">publishes</a> its full Associate Benefits Guide, which includes a clear carve-out prohibiting health plan administrators from providing transgender medical interventions to minors. The company has also been incredibly constructive in engaging with its shareholders on this issue. Other companies should follow Walmart’s example. You’d be amazed by how many haven’t. But the winds are blowing in our favor.
One major example of the large-scale retreat is the widespread drop in support for the Human Rights Campaign, whose ‘Corporate Equality Index’ grades companies in part by their adherence to activist criteria surrounding hormone regimens, transition surgery, and the like. In 2025, almost 380 Fortune 500 companies participated in the Index. In 2026? Fewer than 150. Many of the major names that <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/the-radical-intolerance-behind-woke-corporate-activism?author=Isaac+Willour&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=11&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=The+Radical+Intolerance+Behind+Woke+Corporate+Activism">ceased participation</a>, including Capital One, Goldman Sachs, and Google (Alphabet), are companies we’ve engaged with surrounding these issues.
If these signs are any indication, there’s much more to come. As the consequences of such treatments become more widely understood, by major companies, providers, and especially insurers, we may well see the forming of a new consensus, the one that always should have been: the dictates of gender ideology, that promoted and supported major and often irreversible medical interventions for children, are being rejected by the brands that make up our capital markets. For the sake of America’s children, that rejection can’t come fast enough.
* * *
Isaac Willour is an award-winning journalist focusing on race, culture, and American conservatism, as well as a corporate relations analyst at Bowyer Research. His work has been featured at outlets including USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times Opinion, C-SPAN, and The Daily Wire. He is a member of the Young Voices contributor program and can be found on X <a href="https://twitter.com/IsaacWillour" target="_blank" rel="noopener">@IsaacWillour</a>.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Wall Street Sign

Corporate America Quietly Backs Away From Gender Ideology For Children

Business

Children

Corporations

kids

Teenagers

transgender surgery

Trans flag

This Court Case Has Gotten Little Attention But Just Changed Everything

Doctors

Lawsuit

Matt Walsh

Medical

Opinion

WPATH

New details have emerged in the case of a young female detransitioner who last week <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/detransitioner-awarded-millions-in-first-malpractice-verdict-this-is-how-it-all-ends" target="_blank" rel="noopener">won</a> a $2 million judgment against the doctors who performed a double mastectomy on her when she was just 16 years old.
Notably, the plaintiff, Fox Varian, had her healthy breasts removed about one year after she first started questioning her gender. The teen&#8217;s mother was also pressured into signing off on the surgery, as one medical professional effectively said Varian would kill herself without the surgery.
Varian was given the name Isabella at birth, but changed it numerous times during the fallout from her parents&#8217; split, which included the estrangement of her father, independent journalist Benjamin Ryan said on X. Ryan was in the courtroom for the entire trial, and reported for the <a href="https://www.thefp.com/p/a-legal-first-that-could-change-gender">Free Press</a>.
The young girl suffered from depression, anxiety, and social phobia and was diagnosed with autism and bounced around various schools, Ryan said. She also suffered from eating disorders and body-image issues.
However, at just 15 years old, she started to question her gender &#8220;during sessions with her psychologist,&#8221; who has been identified as psychologist Kenneth Einhorn. Just 11 months after Varian started to socially &#8220;transition,&#8221; the 16-year-old was on an operating table, where Dr. Simon Chin removed her healthy breasts.
In another shocking, yet unsurprising detail, Varian&#8217;s mother, Claire Deacon, was pressured by medical professionals, namely Einhorn, into signing off on her daughter&#8217;s surgical transition. Einhorn insisted Varian was going to kill herself without the surgery. Deacon was effectively presented with the option of having a dead daughter or a &#8220;son&#8221; who has undergone trans procedures.
The jury found that medical professionals failed to consider other possible explanations for Varian’s mental health issues — like depression, ADHD, autism, or body dysmorphia — and rushed to approve an irreversible surgery.
Varian, who recently turned 22, was awarded roughly $1.6 million for past and future suffering, and an additional $400,000 for future medical costs.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Claire Deacon, mother to Fox Varian, the detransitioner who won a $2M jury award after suing her care providers over the mastectomy she got at 16, testified that Varian&#8217;s psychologist, Kenneth Einhorn, browbeat her into consenting with threats of her child&#8217;s suicide.
I report… <a href="https://t.co/3vCfk54FNT">pic.twitter.com/3vCfk54FNT</a>
— Benjamin Ryan (@benryanwriter) <a href="https://twitter.com/benryanwriter/status/2018183382513930585?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 2, 2026</a></blockquote>
There are more than two dozen cases still pending similar to Varian&#8217;s, with detransitioners suing medical professionals for irreversible harm. Varian&#8217;s verdict could be the beginning of the end of the mutilation of children in the name of transgenderism.
&#8220;The case could be a model for other lawsuits over such surgeries performed on minors,&#8221; legal expert Jonathan Turley said. &#8220;There are more than two dozen such lawsuits currently pending in various courts.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
The case could be a model for other lawsuits over such surgeries performed on minors. There are more than two dozen such lawsuits currently pending in various courts. <a href="https://t.co/78RuLrf1Q8">https://t.co/78RuLrf1Q8</a>
— Jonathan Turley (@JonathanTurley) <a href="https://twitter.com/JonathanTurley/status/2017934402903277738?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 1, 2026</a></blockquote>
Activist and detransitioner Chloe Cole, who started to medically transition at just 13 years old, said Varian&#8217;s verdict gives her hope.
&#8220;Varian V Einhorn is the first detransitioner lawsuit to reach a verdict, and Fox Varian was awarded $2M Even better is that this was in New York!&#8221; Cole posted online. &#8220;I am going to trial as well against my doctors with the Center for American Liberty and this gives me even more hope that I will get justice for myself.&#8221; 
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Varian V Einhorn is the first detransitioner lawsuit to reach a verdict, and Fox Varian was awarded $2M
Even better is that this was in New York!
I am going to trial as well against my doctors with <a href="https://twitter.com/Liberty_Ctr?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@Liberty_Ctr</a> and this gives me even more hope that I will get justice for myself <a href="https://t.co/TpbuFvFwuQ">pic.twitter.com/TpbuFvFwuQ</a>
— Chloe Cole ⭐️ (@ChloeCole) <a href="https://twitter.com/ChloeCole/status/2017715062845095966?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 31, 2026</a></blockquote>
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/detransitioner-awarded-millions-in-first-malpractice-verdict-this-is-how-it-all-ends?author=Amanda+Prestigiacomo&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=2&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Detransitioner+Awarded+Millions+In+First+Malpractice+Verdict%3A+‘This+Is+How+It+All+Ends’">Detransitioner Awarded Millions In First Malpractice Verdict: ‘This Is How It All Ends’</a>

Diverse people holding transgender flags

Shocking Details Emerge In Landmark $2 Million ‘Trans’ Malpractice Judgment

New Details Emerge In Landmark ‘Trans’ Malpractice Payout Case

Chloe Cole

detransitioner

malpractice

Belgian authorities have opened an investigation into the 2025 arrest of Lois McLatchie Miller and &#8220;Billboard&#8221; Chris Elston, one year after the activists were detained while conducting interviews on the street.
Miller, a British citizen, and Elston, a Canadian, were in Brussels interviewing passersby about radical gender ideology in June. Miller was holding a sign that read “Children are never born in the wrong body” and Elston — known for debating people on the streets while wearing sandwich boards — held one reading “Children cannot consent to puberty blockers.”
When a threatening crowd began to form, Miller called the police. Four police vans and fourteen officers arrived on the scene, only to arrest and strip-search Miller and Elston, who were held in custody for four hours.
“Opening up a criminal investigation into what happened is a major development,” Miller said. “It’s clear by any measure that our right to free speech was violated when we were put in jail cells for speaking about puberty blockers.&#8221;
Belgian authorities have not yet disclosed the scope of the criminal investigation, leaving open the key question of whether the inquiry is focused on potential misconduct by the police officers involved in the arrests or the conduct of the campaigners themselves. Miller and Elston have spent the past year petitioning the government to offer an apology and financial settlement for what they call an unlawful detention.
The scope of Brussels’s criminal investigation could signal a shift in Europe’s approach to free speech, which American officials warn is under attack on the continent.
“Free speech, I fear, is in retreat,” Vice President JD Vance said last year. “I look to Brussels, where EU Commission commissars warned citizens that they intend to shut down social media during times of civil unrest: the moment they spot what they’ve judged to be ‘hateful content’. Or to this very country where police have carried out raids against citizens suspected of posting anti-feminist comments online as part of ‘combating misogyny’ on the internet.”
The vice president added that he believes Europe will rise to the occasion, and expressed his confidence that Europe’s democracies “are substantially less brittle than many people apparently fear.”
&#8220;We should be able to speak freely about one of the greatest medical scandals in modern history,” Elston said. “Children are being maimed, chemically castrated, and sterilized for an ideology which teaches they were born wrong.”
Elston is no stranger to brushing up against foreign speech codes and hostile crowds. In 2023, he was <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/canadian-cops-watch-as-radical-trans-activists-assault-lone-man-defending-kids" target="_blank" rel="noopener">assaulted</a> during an event in Canada, an attack police did nothing to stop. The following year, he was put on trial in Australia <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/he-shared-a-link-on-x-now-hes-in-an-australian-court" target="_blank" rel="noopener">simply</a> for sharing a link on X.
Months after his arrest in Belgium, Elston <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/billboard-chris-launches-global-nonprofit-to-fight-child-gender-exploitation" target="_blank" rel="noopener">launched</a> a nonprofit dedicated to fighting “medical malpractice of child transition” and defending free speech worldwide.
&#8220;We’re formalizing a grassroots movement to educate, activate, and equip people to protect children,&#8221; Elston told The Daily Wire in an exclusive interview after the organization&#8217;s launch.“We will always endeavor to follow the law, while at the same time challenge abuses of authority.”

Screenshot 2026-01-31 at 1.54.02 PM

Belgium Investigating Arrest And Detention Of ‘Billboard Chris’ And British Activist

Billboard

Free Speech

In an era of spiraling political absurdity, America finds itself squandering precious time and resources on what should be one of the most straightforward, apolitical facts of human existence: only women can get pregnant.
Even Democrat strategist James Carville recently <a href="https://x.com/GrabienMedia/status/2012559321582772621">mocked the absurdity</a> of today’s gender politics on Fox News, saying, “I’m not worried about getting pregnant. I have no idea why this is the number one issue in America.”
It’s time to stop pretending this point of view is controversial. As a mom, I’m calling for this political charade to end in 2026.
After many decades of modern scientific consensus, which follows centuries and even millennia of common sense on the subject, we’ve somehow devolved into laughably ridiculous disagreements over gender. This isn’t just science; it is the order of creation itself, designed by God with intention and clarity. But it is politically unserious to convene hearings where elected politicians and sitting Supreme Court Justices go through the motions of grilling so-called experts on a matter that, in terms of objective reality, isn’t even up for debate.
Imagine a congressional hearing on whether gravity affects everyone equally, or if some people can ‘identify’ as not being subject to such a narrow-minded and restrictive force. Or, imagine someone bringing a case before the Supreme Court to decide whether humans require oxygen to live, or if some could ‘identify’ as anaerobic and live on carbon dioxide alone. We, the serious masses, wouldn’t even entertain the conversation. We would turn our attention to real political issues like immigration, national security, or the economy, and not waste our time.
Speaking of which, I don’t have much time to waste these days. I just welcomed our third child in three years into this world. It was beautiful, painful, exhausting, and awe-inspiring; the kind of experience that reminds you just how extraordinary the female body truly is. God entrusted me to carry a child and give birth, something only a woman can do. A man is simply incapable of doing what I did. That isn’t opinion, it’s biological reality.
And as a mother who just gave birth, I’m exhausted that this ever became a political issue. Women shouldn’t have to fight to own something as fundamental as pregnancy.
Which is why I was so disgusted when I watched the congressional hearing where Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) questioned the so-called “expert,” and (somehow) certified OB/GYN, Dr. Nisha Verma.
Dr. Verma testified before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee on abortion pill safety. She represented Physicians for Reproductive Health, and Sen. Hawley asked her a simple question that has an objective, biological, common-sense answer: “Can men get pregnant?”
Dr. Verma, who definitely knows the answer, repeatedly dodged the question — insisting instead that it was a “political tool” that “polarized” the discussion and failed to capture the “complex experiences” of her patients. I wonder if Dr. Verma would also dodge questions about whether people could choose to live without oxygen or decide that gravity doesn’t apply to them. Would she claim such farcical questions are political tools that polarize?
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
SPOILER ALERT: Men cannot get pregnant <a href="https://t.co/08JwHUlxIj">pic.twitter.com/08JwHUlxIj</a>
— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) <a href="https://twitter.com/HawleyMO/status/2011480384467349892?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 14, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Credit: @HawleyMO/X.com
That is really the crux of the issue here; none of this should be treated as a political issue. A serious nation would not waste another moment nor another taxpayer dollar entertaining such an unserious conversation. The entire premise should be dismissed outright as unworthy of the time it would take to even ask such a ludicrous question. Stop indulging delusion and start governing in reality.
Incredibly, this Senate hearing came just days after the Supreme Court heard arguments regarding men in women’s sports. Ironically, this is the same thing that happened to one of the sitting Justices during her confirmation hearing, when she was unable to answer a similar question — “What is a woman?” More incredible still, she and every other person still hung up on this issue suddenly know what a woman is when it comes to breaking the glass ceiling and placing the first black woman on the Supreme Court of the United States.
Suddenly, they all know what a woman is? Suddenly, that distinction matters? No, not suddenly. They always knew because it’s an objective, reality-based fact that isn’t up for debate, unless we pretend along with those who want to bend reality.
Even James Carville wasn’t just stating a fact; he was calling out how absurd the debate itself has become. His joke on Fox News wasn’t about biology; it was about how fake and manufactured this entire controversy is. But Democrats keep entertaining fiction to pander to rabid extremists and then expect the rest of the country to play along.
The bottom line is simple: there is no debate, so entertaining one is foolish. Polling consistently shows that most Americans are willing to publicly admit that they understand the biological reality of sex. Voters aren’t confused, but Washington is pretending to be. Americans are tired of political grandstanding on issues that don’t matter. And 2026 should be the year this nonsense ends.
It’s time to stop coddling absurdity as though we owe irrationality an esteemed seat at every table. One might say that when you wrestle with a pig in lipstick, it’s still a pig, and you both get dirty. It’s not respect, and it’s not compassion. It’s suicidal empathy. If we let lunacy hijack constructive conversation, we all crash together.
###
Jillian Anderson King is a former Washington Redskins Cheerleader Ambassador and ABC’s The Bachelor and The Bachelor in Paradise contestant. She’s a Mombassador for Moms for America, an ambassador for Turning Point and Turning Point Faith, and a proud Christian Conservative mother and wife. Jillian is also the founder of The Kings Firm, a strategic communications firm.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

27th SCAD Savannah Film Festival – Portraits

Men Can’t Get Pregnant. Even James Carville Knows That.

Josh Hawley

Mothers

Pregnancy

SCOTUS

Supreme Court

Women

Like many young American girls, when I was a teenager, I hated myself and my body. I was unhappy and anxious. Eventually, I was diagnosed with depression and anorexia. 
It goes without saying that I was no stranger to feeling like I wasn’t “me” in my own body. No one told me to get liposuction for my anorexia. But when I went to the counselor’s office for my first appointment for gender dysphoria, I left with a letter of approval for testosterone.
Since I’ve detransitioned, life has felt like a roller coaster. The physical distress I experienced going through hormone “therapy” and surgery that drastically changed my body is only one portion of how horrific it truly is to not only attempt something impossible by supposedly transitioning from one gender to another, but to return to identifying with reality.
I was called a patient, but from start to finish, I was never treated like one.
Being a patient requires informed consent and the exhaustion of all avenues of care before resorting to the most drastic option. And yet, from the start, doctors were ecstatic to accelerate my so-called transition without once suggesting mental health treatment. Instead, a counselor suggested almost immediately that I needed to be put on wrong-sex hormones. When I raised any suspicion that this was not the right choice for me, the doctors were far from supportive and made me feel like my voice didn’t matter anymore. I was praised for raising my voice and embracing who I thought I was, but only when I identified as trans. Yet when I voiced a dissenting opinion on the same topic, the response was underwhelming and even shame-inducing.
For years, gender clinics, medical associations, and activist groups have driven the conversation around so-called “gender-affirming care,” but there has never been any long-term testing done to see what the implications of these treatments are on minors, especially the ones still going through puberty. Any time a question was raised as to whether this was safe, or if there could be a possibility of trans-identifying minors changing their minds down the road, it was diminished as “rare” and accused of putting politics over the mental health of these children.
The Trump administration has been the first presidential administration to sound the alarm on these harmful practices. For the first time, federal agencies started to ask the questions that detransitioners had been trying to warn the public about: are these “treatments” actually safe, or are they doing more harm than good?
In his first year back in office, President Trump has elevated the voices of detransitioners like me. Last summer, I had the honor of testifying <a href="https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/GAC-RFI-FINAL.pdf">in front of the Federal Trade Commission</a>, sharing my experience of how I was essentially forced into “gender-affirming care,” instead of the mental health care and therapy I desperately needed. Only a few years ago, my voice would have never been heard in the federal landscape.
Gender medicine has thrived in a system with zero accountability. I am proud to be at the forefront of a movement that is finally asking for the kind of accountability that is long overdue.
Detransitioners like me have been gaslit into believing we are anomalies, and that if doctors hadn’t taken action, we would’ve been suicidal or worse, dead. What the mainstream doesn’t want you to know is that my mental health issues didn’t magically disappear overnight once I began transitioning — they actually got worse. Yet the doctors who led me down this path have faced zero opposition and zero accountability — until now.
President Trump and his administration have been a disruptor to the system of gender ideology since day one. His administration has led the charge to make sure that the doctors, experts, and gender-ideology apologists finally answer the questions that have been stamped down, argued as ridiculous, and smeared by those who chose ideology over reality.
One of the first actions President Trump took upon being back in the Oval Office was <a href="https://www.independentwomen.com/2025/01/28/president-trump-protects-americas-children-from-chemical-surgical-mutilation-in-latest-executive-order/">signing an executive order</a> to protect minors from receiving any sex-changing surgery or procedure. This executive order also directs the Department of Health and Human Services to prevent taxpayer dollars from being used to subsidize irreversible medical harm to children. HHS’s proposed guardrails bar hospitals that perform “gender-affirming care” from participating in Medicare and Medicaid.
Late last year, HHS also <a href="https://www.independentwomen.com/2025/12/18/hhs-takes-historic-action-to-ban-body-mutilating-medical-procedures-targeting-gender-confused-youth/">released a peer-reviewed, evidence-based review</a> concluding pediatric gender interventions lack long-term safety data and do not meet professionally recognized standards of care. Secretary Kennedy formally declared that these dangerous procedures were far outside acceptable medical practice. This bold move was the nail in the coffin of the claim that “the science is settled” and got gender medicine back on track based on evidence, ethics, and informed consent.
Detransitioners like myself are grateful for the actions taken by the Trump administration that will ensure the safety and well-being of the next generation.
While my detransitioner friends and I may not have been protected, I know that the work we have put in — in speaking out, standing up, and tirelessly testifying across the country — will have a meaningful impact in protecting kids who are struggling with their mental health. I will continue to fight for the childhoods of every gender-confused kid out there so that they are protected from fear, coercion, and medical harm.
* * *
Prisha Mosley is an Independent Women ambassador and detransitioner. Independent Women Features, the storytelling platform of Independent Women, featured Prisha’s story as part of its “Identity Crisis” docu-series, which highlights the irreversible harms of gender ideology. Prisha’s story, including her pregnancy journey, was documented in two parts, which can be found <a href="https://www.iwfeatures.com/documentary/mentally-ill-teen-betrayed-by-health-professionals-who-recommended-testosterone-and-top-surgery/">here</a> and <a href="https://www.iwfeatures.com/documentary/a-detransitioners-pregnancy-journey/">here</a>.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.
This article has been edited for clarity.

Trump Executive Orders

A Year Of Action To Protect Kids From Child Mutilation

Donald Trump

Puberty blockers

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

The following is an edited transcript from <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-1891-the-real-reason-trump-plans-to-conquer-greenland?elementPosition=10&amp;row=2&amp;rowHeadline=Latest+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel">The Michael Knowles Show</a>.
* * *
The Left can’t let the transgender issue go away.
They were clobbered on it last November. They’ve been losing on it for years. Conservatives won the argument, decisively — and yet the Left keeps dragging it back into the spotlight. Now they’re pushing cases all the way to the Supreme Court under the guise of “defending girls’ sports,” even as the Court is actively weighing a major transgender-related case.
That context matters, because it’s why a recent Senate hearing landed the way it did.
During a Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee (HELP) hearing focused on abortion drugs, Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO), one of the best to ever do it, grilled Democrat witness Dr. Nisha Verma, a board-certified obstetrician-gynecologist, on the question that has dominated American politics for the past five years.
The exchange, which quickly went viral, revolved around a simple inquiry: “Can men get pregnant?”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
SPOILER ALERT: Men cannot get pregnant <a href="https://t.co/08JwHUlxIj">pic.twitter.com/08JwHUlxIj</a>
— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) <a href="https://twitter.com/HawleyMO/status/2011480384467349892?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 14, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Hawley is so good at this.
This question is just another version of “What is a Woman?” It’s another way of asking whether men can become women. It should be a layup for the Left. All they have to say is: “No, men cannot become pregnant.”
They could even try to weasel out of it. They could say something about “trans men” or redefine terms in the usual bureaucratic way. Any halfway competent liberal operative would recognize that this issue is pure political poison and dodge it immediately. 
But they can’t.
The transgender issue may be the single biggest loser for the Left in my lifetime — possibly even more damaging than their insistence on flooding the country with foreign criminals. And yet they refuse to abandon it. Not because it’s culturally edgy or titillating, but because it represents the inescapable conclusion of their entire political project.
Conservatives sometimes understate what’s actually going on here. We describe transgenderism as a natural outgrowth of gay marriage, gay rights, or feminism — movements that insist men and women are fundamentally the same. That’s part of the story, but it doesn’t go deep enough.
The reason Republicans and conservatives keep hammering this issue — and the reason the Left cannot give it up — is because it strikes at the core of liberalism itself.
At its heart, liberalism is about maximizing individual autonomy. That idea goes back centuries. The seed of liberalism says: I am primarily an individual, and I will control everything. I will control my destiny, my traditions, my morality, my religion, my history, and even my country. And eventually, I will liberate myself from my own body.
That is the culmination.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-1891-the-real-reason-trump-plans-to-conquer-greenland?elementPosition=10&amp;row=2&amp;rowHeadline=Latest+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel">WATCH: The Michael Knowles Show</a></h3>
It took centuries to get here. First, we had to liberate ourselves from the king. Then from the Church. Then from the family, through the liberalization of divorce. Then from history, through radical revisionism. Then from the nation, through the collapse of patriotism. Then from the moral order, especially in matters of sex.
And finally, liberation from biological reality itself.
Liberalism is not complete until the body is treated as irrelevant.
Which brings us, inevitably, to St. Thomas Aquinas.
Aquinas identified the idea underlying transgenderism — that the body has nothing to do with who we really are — as one of the oldest and most dangerous heresies. The belief that I am born male but am really female, and therefore my body is wrong or bad, is not new. It appears in ancient heresies like Gnosticism and Docetism, which treated matter as corrupt and the physical world as a mistake.
Aquinas argued that these were the worst heresies of all, because they directly deny the central truth of Christianity: the Incarnation — that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.
So it should not surprise us that modern liberalism, which often functions as an inversion of Christianity, would culminate in precisely this heresy. A political philosophy built on autonomy over reality eventually arrives at the rejection of the body itself.
That’s why the Left can’t walk away from this issue, no matter how badly it hurts them politically.
It isn’t just another policy debate.
It’s the logical endpoint of their worldview.

Senator Josh Hawley

Why The Left Can’t Let The Transgender Debate Go

Catholicism

Democrats

Leftists

Michael Knowles

Republicans

U.S. Senate

What Is A Woman

Tomorrow, the Supreme Court will hear a case about trans-identifying boys participating in girls’ sports. A West Virginia law is at the center of the hearing.
The Daily Wire has been at the forefront of the battle over gender ideology. Exhibit A: Matt Walsh’s groundbreaking documentary What Is A Woman?
It’s one thing for an adult to fight the good fight and entirely another for an eighth-grade girl to take a stand.
They say this case will affect laws in 27 states. But it’s already directly affected the life of one young girl in West Virginia.
Here she is in her own words. — Joel Kneedler
* * *
Eighth grade. The year when most girls are making core memories with friends and preparing for that exciting, albeit scary, transition to high school. But for me, that year was frustrating and uncomfortable.
As a young female athlete, I lost out on the opportunity to compete in West Virginia’s Mid-Mountain Championship track-and-field meet and had to endure sexually harassing comments from a male athlete who was allowed to join the girls’ team at my middle school.
Now, I’m 17 years old and eagerly looking to the U.S. Supreme Court as it hears — for the first time — why it should protect female athletes and affirm the biological reality that boys and girls are different.
<div id="attachment_1026433" style="width: 874px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1026433" class="size-large wp-image-1026433" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/West-Virginia-II-864x576.jpg" alt="Credit: Adaleia Cross." width="864" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/West-Virginia-II-864x576.jpg 864w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/West-Virginia-II-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/West-Virginia-II-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/West-Virginia-II.jpg 900w" sizes=" (max-width: 864px) 100vw, 864px" />Credit: Adaleia Cross.</div>
The Court is considering two cases: <a href="https://adflegal.org/case/bpj-v-west-virginia-state-board-education/?utm_source=dailywire&amp;utm_medium=oped">one</a> being litigated by Attorney General JB McCuskey of my home state of West Virginia and <a href="https://adflegal.org/case/little-v-hecox/?utm_source=dailywire&amp;utm_medium=oped">another</a> led by Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador. Both states are joined by legal counsel from Alliance Defending Freedom, which has represented me in other cases. These states enacted laws to restore common sense, fairness, and safety in women’s sports. Shortly afterward, however, activists who believe that boys should be able to compete against girls challenged both laws. The lawsuit in my state was brought on behalf of the male athlete competing on my girls’ track-and-field team.
That athlete displaced 423 different girls 1,100 times and took 57 medals from them. Those young women will never get those opportunities back. And that’s just one athlete. Other girls and women across the country, from middle school to college to the Olympics, continue to tell their stories of bravely choosing to <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-female-fencer-and-trans-supporting-usa-fencing-head-face-off-at-heated-doge-hearing">forfeit games</a> or matches in defense of biological truth. Or they talk about the heartache of losing to males who take roster spots and stand on <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/cheated-betrayed-and-violated-riley-gaines-reflects-on-journey-to-protect-girls-sports?author=Amanda+Prestigiacomo&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=undefined&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=%E2%80%98Cheated%2C+Betrayed%2C+And+Violated%E2%80%99%3A+Riley+Gaines+Reflects+On+Journey+To+Protect+Girls+Sports">winner podiums</a> meant for girls.
Until April 2023, I was in the top three on my team for discus in both seventh and eighth grade. I was usually in the top three or four for shot put as well. But that changed when the male started beating me.
It felt strange to be kicked out of my events because I had always gotten to compete before. I felt angry and discouraged that a male athlete took my spot. But I also felt like I couldn’t say anything about it. If I complained, I was made to feel like the problem for feeling uncomfortable and recognizing the unfairness. I felt like I had to suck it up and live with it. I felt unheard and unseen.
It’s extremely frustrating to know that no matter how hard I work, I will not be able to throw farther than the male athlete. Being excluded from a competition before it even begins is discouraging; I am obviously not as strong and athletic as most boys my age. It makes me so angry that I do not even have a chance to win. I want to scream, “Why am I even here?”
In fact, I’ve decided not to compete in track and field in high school because of the male athletes’ participation. 
It’s frustrating that I have to give up the sport I love — and excel at — because school officials have allowed males to compete with the girls. A male’s belief about his gender doesn’t erase the physical advantages over females.
Losing opportunities to compete at higher levels is very frustrating, but even worse was having to endure the athlete’s sexual, vulgar comments directed at me. Not to mention having to share a locker room. No girl should be forced to change in front of a boy or share such intimate spaces with the opposite sex.
In sports, biology matters. In life, it does too.
Gender ideology is full of lies that hurt real people. Believing that a male can erase physical differences with drugs impacts so much more than just girls’ sports. Women deserve their own spaces. Men don’t belong in women’s showers, restrooms, locker rooms, overnight school trips, prisons, or shelters.
All this weighs heavily on my heart, not just for me, but for my little sister, who is an incredible athlete.
<div id="attachment_1026429" style="width: 874px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1026429" class="size-large wp-image-1026429" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/Untitled-design-14-864x576.jpg" alt="Credit: Adaleia Cross." width="864" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/Untitled-design-14-864x576.jpg 864w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/Untitled-design-14-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/Untitled-design-14-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/Untitled-design-14.jpg 900w" sizes=" (max-width: 864px) 100vw, 864px" />Credit: Adaleia Cross.</div>
It’s not true that a man can be a woman. If we want a society that respects women, we must accept that reality. Title IX was designed to guarantee equal opportunity for women. We can’t go backward. 
 
I may only be one voice from West Virginia, but I know I stand on the shoulders of trailblazers who have championed women’s rights for years. And today, I join a new chorus of women — we’re young and paying attention. We’re also grateful for this incredible opportunity to ask the Supreme Court to listen to our stories and allow states to defend biological reality, fairness, and female athletes.
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Adaleia Cross is a West Virginia high school student.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.
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I’m One Of The Girls Title IX Was Meant To Protect

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