Mostly along partisan lines, legislature overrides governor’s veto of bill that would ban gender-affirming care to minors in Kentucky

The Senate voted 29-8 to override the veto, with one Republican voting against the override and one Democrat changing her vote. Soon after, the House voted 76-23 for the override, with four Republicans voting against the measure and one Democrat voting for it.

Protesters were chanting loudly from the halls while the Senate overrode the veto. In the House,  protesters in the gallery yelled, “Henry, Zachee — they should be with us today.”

This chant was in reference to Sen. Karen Berg’s 24-year-old transgender son, Henry, who died by suicide in December and the shooting death of a Louisville transgender woman, Zachee Imanitwitaho.

Kentucky State Police arrested 19 of the protesters, according to the Lexington Herald-Leader.

“KSP gave each individual the option to leave without any enforcement action or be placed under arrest,” Capt. Paul Blanton, a KSP spokesperson, told the Herald-Leader in a prepared statement.

Earlier that morning, hundreds of LGBTQ+ youth and their supporters rallied to ask the lawmakers to not override Beshear’s veto.

Before being removed, the protesters in the House were so loud that it was difficult to hear the lawmakers explaining their “no” votes during the veto override, even with their efforts to be heard.

Senate Bill 150, sponsored by Sen. Max Wise, R-Campbellsville, would ban gender-affirming treatment for Kentuckians under 18, including surgeries and puberty-blocking hormones, even if parents want the treatment for their children.

It would bar schools from requiring teachers to use a transgender student’s preferred pronouns, keep trans students from using bathrooms that fit their gender identity, and bans instruction that explores “gender identity, gender expression or sexual orientation,” among other sex-education requirements.

Wise focused his comments on the school-related requirements, with little said about the bans on gender-affirming care for trans youth.

“The goal is to strengthen parental engagement and communication in children’s education while protecting the safety of our children,” he said while explaining the bill on the Senate floor.

“I’ve had countless number of people coming up to me from both sides of the aisle to say, ‘Thank you for standing up for common sense. Thank you for standing up and being willing to stand in that gap, to be willing to take whatever it is thrown our way,’’ Wise said on the Senate floor while explaining the bill. “If it’s hit jobs from newspaper activists, if it is for standing up for parents, for those that do not show up here in committee meetings to testify because they’re working and because they are also dependent upon us in a representative democracy, that we can make common sense decisions here that protect our children.”Berg opened her remarks by reading the words her son, Henry Berg-Brousseau, wrote for the Human Rights Campaign that was published the day before he took his life.

“To say this is a bill protecting children is completely disingenuous. And to call this a parent rights bill is an absolute despicable affront to me personally,” she said. “We are denying families their physicians and their therapists the right to make medically informed decisions for their families. Not a single reputable society, National Medical Society in this country, supports what we are doing today. The data at this point is unequivocal.  The misinformation is appalling. Appalling that you allow this information to stand.”

“My fear and my no vote is for those kids that are being left you Those kids that may be contemplating suicide, that may need to delay puberty, that that could have a huge impact on them. We’re taking away an option that a family that a doctor would have — we’re not doctors, with the exception of a couple of us, we’re not doctors, I trust them to make the right decisions when they are dealing with those kids in those specific instances.”

Minority Leader Derrick Graham of Frankfort said, “Over my 21 years, this is the worst bill I’ve had to vote for on this floor. . . .  For over 40 years, you want limited government, you want local control, you believe in individual responsibilities, and government intervention is not the real answer to solving our problems. Well, all of those four things that I just went off and talked about, you’ve done. You’ve invaded on the rights of the parents, you’ve invaded on the rights of the individuals who were here today.”