Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals rules against Biden’s transgender mandate

Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals rules against Biden’s transgender mandate

In a tremendous victory for the religious liberty of healthcare professionals, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals blocked the Biden Administration’s transgender mandate.

In Sisters of Mercy v. Becerra, a group of Catholic hospitals, nuns, and a Catholic university that operates medical clinics for the poor, sued the Biden administration over a mandate that would have forced religious doctors and hospitals to perform mutilative gender surgeries on any patient, including children.

In May 2021, the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced it would expand the definition of “sex” to include “sexual orientation and gender identity” in Title VII’s provision against employment discrimination. The new rule did not contain any religious liberty protections. 

In August of this year, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the government could not force doctors to perform gender “transition” surgeries if it contradicted their beliefs. The Court upheld a permanent injunction against the HHS rule for another group of Catholic health care providers. 

This week, the Eighth Circuit affirmed the Fifth Circuit’s decision and protected the First Amendment rights of medical professionals. It relied heavily on the Fifth Circuit court’s ruling, noting that the Eight Circuit Court found “instructive the Fifth Circuit’s recent decision in Franciscan Alliance.”

“We agree with these courts and therefore conclude that the district court correctly held that ‘intrusion upon the Catholic Plaintiffs’ exercise of religion is sufficient to show irreparable harm,’” wrote the Eighth Circuit in its decision.

While this decision does not apply to all states, it sets a crucial precedent for future religious liberty cases. 

“Today’s victory sets an important precedent that religious healthcare professionals are free to practice medicine in accordance with their consciences and experienced professional judgment,” said Luke Goodrich of Becket Law. “The government’s attempt to force doctors to go against their consciences was bad for patients, bad for doctors, and bad for religious liberty.”

Extensive research shows the detrimental effects of puberty blockers, cross-sex hormone administration, and bodily mutilation. These procedures have been linked to loss of fertility, cardiac disease, loss of bone density, and increased cancer risk.

Further, the puberty blockers that doctors give to children suffering from gender dysphoria are the same substances used to castrate sex offenders. This is not healthcare;it’s child abuse. 

The good news is that the majority of Americans recognize how radical and abusive these procedures are. According to a recent Trafalgar Group/Convention of States Action poll, almost 80% of likely voters believe that children should not be able to receive puberty blockers and permanent sex change procedures. 

Our job is to continue to expose clinics that are participating in this child abuse and share the ugly truth about gender “transition” procedures. Children suffering from gender dysphoria deserve real help, not harm. Moreover, doctors should never be forced to harm children and provide a service that violates their conscience. 

We are hopeful that the Eighth Circuit’s ruling will set a lasting precedent for other courts and that religious liberty for healthcare professionals will be upheld all across the country, including here in Wisconsin.

 

Conservative activist exposes Vanderbilt, demonstrates that exposing the truth can save children from mutilation

Conservative activist exposes Vanderbilt, demonstrates that exposing the truth can save children from mutilation

Thanks to online trends and social contagion, rates of transgender affiliation are soaring while a growing number of clinics are harming children with dangerous, experimental procedures. However, several conservative activists are speaking out and demonstrating that sharing the truth can make a real difference. 

Last month, Daily Wire host Matt Walsh posted a twitter thread revealing Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s (VUMC) dangerous so-called  “gender-affirming” practices. “My team and I have been investigating the transgender clinic at Vanderbilt here in Nashville. Vanderbilt drugs, chemically castrates, and performs double mastectomies on minors. But it gets worse…” wrote Walsh. 

A Daily Wire report stated that Walsh uncovered video and archived webpages from VUMC describing a doctor’s promotion of transgender therapies and surgeries in addition to threats against medical professionals who have  moral objections to these procedures. In videos shared by Walsh, a VUMC doctor is seen bragging about how lucrative cross-sex hormones, puberty blocking therapies, and mutilation surgeries are because they require “a lot of follow-ups.” Particular surgeries were described in dollar signs. 

Shortly after the report was published, the University put a pause on its child mutilation procedures. “HUGE NEWS: following our report, Vanderbilt has agreed to pause all gender transition surgeries on minors. The fight is far from over but this will save children from mutilation and abuse. An incredibly important victory. Praise God,” tweeted Walsh. 

The left wants to keep their radical practices in the dark, and they are threatened when the truth is exposed. Like Walsh, Chris Rufo, Libs of Tiktok and other conservative activists, we must continue to speak out against the child abuse being committed by a growing number of clinics to save children from permanent damage. With enough public backlash, these clinics will be forced to stop their “gender affirming” procedures as Vanderbilt has. 

While alarming stories of gender affirmative clinics are emerging from other states, Wisconsin children are also at risk of succumbing to the lies and consequences of gender ideology. Here in Wisconsin, the Pediatric Adolescent Transgender Health Clinic (PATH Clinic) at the University of Wisconsin Health “work[s] with gender expansive children and teens.” We don’t know exactly what the clinic’s “gender affirmative” approach entails, but we do know that these programs act as a gateway to mutilation and sterilization. Our job is to call them out for abusing children and demand that they provide those suffering from gender dysphoria with real help, not harm. 

We should also focus on highlighting the stories of detransitioners who are speaking out against the abuse they endured and detailing the irreversible physical and emotional damage they now live with. 

A new film from the Center for Bioethics and Culture shares the testimonies of three women who received different forms of “gender-affirming” services and procedures only to find that the “treatments” that were supposed to alleviate their confusion only caused them more harm.

“I wasn’t functioning at all. I wasn’t holding down a job. I wasn’t going to school. I just felt like a monster. Once I stopped the testosterone, the symptoms all went away and I started feeling like myself again,” said one detransitioner named Helena.

The three girls, and many others like them, are addressing other children who are suffering from gender dysphoria and urging them to avoid puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and any kind of “gender affirming” care. Their transparency acts as a beacon of hope in a culture that’s become obsessed with placing children in charge of their gender. 

Mangling healthy bodies should never be the solution to a mental health crisis. In fact, it’s only exacerbating the crisis. By sharing the truth about the danger that many clinics are subjecting children to and sharing the hopeful stories of detransitioners, we can make a real difference and put an end to child abuse disguised as healthcare.

California bill endangers parental rights – even in Wisconsin

California bill endangers parental rights – even in Wisconsin

California Democrats have just passed a radical bill that poses serious threats to parental rights and children’s safety around the country.

S.B. 107 allows California courts to remove custody from parents who are opposed to their young children undergoing irreversible medical procedures, according to the National Review

Any child can “flee” to California for this purpose, or any person “acting as a parent” can take a child to California to obtain this abusive “treatment.”

S.B. 107 just passed both chambers of the state legislature and is now in the hands of the Gov. Gavin Newsom. 

If Gov. Newsom signs S.B. 107, California courts will be given “temporary emergency jurisdiction” over any child in California, regardless of which state they reside in, allowing them to receive harmful interventions without parental consent. This attempt at severe government overreach violates federal law regarding jurisdiction over custody matters and the laws of the 49 other states which need to be respected according to the “full faith and credit” clause of the U.S. Constitution. 

This bill is extreme—even for California. And it has implications for every state. SB 107 would allow Wisconsin children to be essentially “kidnapped” by the state of California so that these minors can undergo bodily mutilation and sterilization before they’re old enough to understand the consequences of these actions. Further, any parent who opposes the lies being fed to their child will be met by forceful opposition made up by courts, police, and child-protective services.

Not only are legislators ignoring the basic rights of parents, but they are disregarding the clear evidence demonstrating the damage caused by gender “affirming” medical and surgical interventions on children. 

The American College of Pediatricians’ found that 80 to 95 percent of children who suffer from gender dysphoria will eventually re-identify with their biological sex, if they are not pushed into trying to do the impossible—change their sex.. Further, according to a recent study by the Heritage Foundation, increased access to gender “affirming” care doesn’t improve mental health outcomes. It only increases a child’s risk for suicide. 

Ultimately, gender “transition” surgeries mutilate healthy bodies, affirm dangerous lies, and lead to psychological derangement. It is undeniably abusive to allow vulnerable children to permanently damage their bodies. 

We need to keep California from getting its hands on our children and blatantly undermining parents. Bringing national attention to this bill and highlighting its danger will give us a chance to persuade Gov. Newsom to veto the bill. Let’s urge our state officials to do just that and call California out for its extremism and child abuse. This is a great question to ask candidates for governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, and even those running for state senate or state assembly seats: 

“Will you actively work to protect Wisconsin’s parents and children from the long-arm of liberal elected officials in California—or any other state seeking to lure minor children, take them into “protective custody” for purposes of prescribing harmful drugs and/or performing dangerous surgeries in an effort to do the impossible, change their sex?”

No parent should ever face the unimaginable anger caused by the mutilation and abuse of their children, like many already have. Parents alone have the right to make medical decisions for their children, and it is far beyond the boundaries of California courts to take those deeply personal decisions into their own hands. Children belong to their parents, not the government. 

Please pray that this bill is defeated along with the evil ideas behind it.