Roy Cooper, the Democratic governor of North Carolina, just vetoed a bill that has as its goal the protection of children from gender transition surgery.
This bill, House Bill 808, is one of three related bills that Cooper vetoed on Wednesday, according to the Associated Press.
One of the other two bills, House Bill 574, looks "to protect opportunities for women and girls in athletics." The final bill Cooper vetoed is Senate Bill 49, "an act to enumerate the rights of parents to direct the upbringing, education, health care, and mental health of their minor children."
As will be demonstrated, ultimately, Cooper's vetoes should fail.
This bill is "an act to prohibit gender transition procedures for minors." The political left refers to such procedures as "gender-affirming care," hiding the true nature of such "care."
The bill, in part, makes it "unlawful for a medical professional to perform a surgical gender transition procedure on a minor or to prescribe, provide, or dispense puberty-blocking drugs or cross-sex hormones to a minor."
The bill, however, does provide several exceptions. For example, the bill states that, so long as "the minor's parents or guardians give informed consent, a medical professional" may provide to a minor:
Services to persons born with a medically verifiable disorder of sex development, including a person with external biological sex characteristics that are unresolvedly ambiguous, such as those born with 46 XX chromosomes with virilization, 46 XY chromosomes with under-virilization, or having both ovarian and testicular tissue.
The bill also allows a medical professional to continue or complete a court of treatment for a minor if certain conditions are met.
Those who violate the law will have their medical licenses revoked.
As stated at the outset, Cooper vetoed all three bills, including H.B. 808.
Afterward, Cooper put out multiple statements in support of his action.
Here is what he said about his veto of H.B. 808:
A doctor’s office is no place for politicians, and North Carolina should continue to let parents and medical professionals make decisions about the best way to offer gender care for their children. Ordering doctors to stop following approved medical protocols sets a troubling precedent and is dangerous for vulnerable youth and their mental health. The government should not make itself both the parent and the doctor.
Cooper, in general, accused Republicans of "serving up a triple threat of political culture wars using government to invade the rights and responsibilities of parents and doctors, hurting vulnerable children, and damaging our state’s reputation and economy like they did with the harmful bathroom bill." Cooper further alleged that Republicans are doing so "for campaign purposes only."
Despite Cooper's veto of the three bills, the bills are expected to become law as state Republicans have a veto-proof majority in both North Carolina's House and Senate.
