Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed sweeping legislation on Wednesday which bans sex-reassignment surgeries and cross-sex hormones for anyone under 18. The bill also bans forcing students to identify their pronouns and transgender students from using opposite sex bathrooms. After the signing event, DeSantis declared that it is time to let kids be kids. The governor said:
“I feel very strongly as governor, but also just as a dad of a 6 or 5 and a 3-year-old that you know, we need to let our kids just be kids. And we have a very crazy age that we live in,” DeSantis said. “There’s a lot of nonsense that gets floated around. And what we’ve said in Florida is we are going to remain a refuge of sanity and a citadel of normalcy.”
“And kids should have an upbringing that that reflects that,” he continued. “And I think that there’s a lot of emphasis in other parts of the country and in our society as a whole to take that away from them. And we’re not going to let that happen here in Florida.”
Before signing the legislation DeSantis also noted:
“This will permanently outlaw the mutilation of minors. It will outlaw the surgical procedures and experimental puberty blockers for minors,” he said prior to signing SB 254. “It will also require any adults receiving these surgeries to be informed about the irreversible nature and about the dangers of the procedures. It will give the courts temporary jurisdiction to intervene and halt procedures for out-of-state children.”
“This is going to create a way to recover damages for injury or death resulting from mutilating surgeries or these experimental puberty blockers that are given to a minor,” DeSantis also said.
DeSantis faced a wave of backlash from LGBTQ and transgender activists who claim that the laws are hateful towards the transgender community. DeSantis on the other hand, claims that he is committed to making his state a refuge of sanity.
