The Ohio State Senate has successfully overridden the governor’s veto of a bill that both bans transgender procedures on minors and restricts trans-identifying student-athletes from competing in the category of the sex they self-identify as.
Ohio House Bill 689 is a comprehensive piece of legislation that includes both the “Save Adolescents from Experimentation Act” and the “Save Women’s Sports Act.” The first part of the bill bans transgender surgeries on minors, including double mastectomies for girls, hormone therapies, and genital procedures. The second part of the bill prohibits biological boys who self-identify as girls from competing in the female category of sports at all age levels, including K-12 and at the collegiate level.
Ohio Governor Mike DeWine initially vetoed the bill last December. DeWine argued that the bill would violate parental rights, stating parents have a better say in the medical decisions of their children than the state.
“Were I to sign House Bill 68, or were House Bill 68 to become law, Ohio would be saying that the state, that the government, knows better what is best for a child than the two people who know that child the best – the parents,” DeWine said last December when he vetoed the bill.
“Ultimately, I believe this is about protecting human life,” DeWine continued. “Many parents have told me that their child would not have survived, would be dead today, if they had not received the treatment they received from one of Ohio’s children’s hospitals. I’ve also been told by those who are now grown adults that but for this care, they would have taken their life when they were teenagers.”
However, after vetoing the bill, the Ohio State Senate received the required number of votes to override the governor’s decision, establishing the bill as law. The law is set to take effect in approximately 90 days.
Ohio joins a growing number of states—currently at least 22—that have enacted laws aimed at safeguarding minors from dangerous and irreversible transgender medical treatments. However, these laws continue to face legal challenges from left-wing advocacy groups arguing in favor of what they term “gender-affirming medical care” for children.
