Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis forcefully denounced transgender surgery for minors during Wednesday’s Republican presidential debate, arguing that the procedure is akin to child abuse.
“You have no right to abuse your children. This mutilates these minors, this is an irreversible procedure,” the 45-year-old said.
DeSantis touted sweeping legislation he signed into law in Florida earlier this year that bans the administration of puberty blockers or hormone therapy to minors and bans performing sex-change surgery on children.
“We cannot allow this to happen in this country,” he added, without saying whether he would support similar legislation at the federal level as president.
Biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy went further than DeSantis, arguing that “transgenderism is a mental health disorder,” and he challenged Florida’s governor to support the use of federal funds to ban “genital mutilation or chemical castration” for minors.
“We don’t let you smoke cigarettes at 18. We don’t let you drink addictive alcohol at 21,” Ramaswamy reasoned, noting that former President Ronald Reagan was able to increase the drinking. age in 1984 by freezing federal funds for state highways in states that prohibit persons under the age of 21 from purchasing or possessing alcoholic beverages.
“At the federal level, I am clear. That’s where I stand,” he said.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis slammed transgender surgery for minors during Wednesday’s Republican presidential debate, arguing that the procedure is akin to child abuse. AFP via Getty Images
Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie argued that his support for giving parents the final say, rather than government officials, should not be a disqualifying post for a Republican seeking the party’s presidential nomination.
“The people of the Republic believe in a government that has less, not more, and less involvement with the government, not more government involvement in the lives of the people,” he said. “I trust parents.”
“I stand up every time for parents to be able to make decisions for their young children,” Christie said, noting that “occasionally, parents will make decisions that we don’t agree with.”
“When you start taking that right away from a parent, you don’t know, that slippery slope, what right is going to be taken away next,” he argued.
DeSantis touted sweeping legislation he signed into law in Florida earlier this year that bans the administration of puberty blockers or hormone therapy to minors and bans performing sex-change surgery on children. Reuters
Former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley was forced to defend her handling of state legislation in 2016 that sought to ban transgender individuals from using restrooms that do not align with their biological sex.
DeSantis has accused Haley of killing the so-called bathroom bill.
“When I was governor, 10 years ago, when the bathroom situation came up, we probably had a handful of kids dealing with the issue and I said, ‘We don’t need to bring the government into this,'” he said.
“Now, 10 years later, we see that this issue has exploded. And this shows how hypocritical Ron is. When he ran for governor [in 2018] and they asked him about it, he said he didn’t think the bathroom bill was a good use of his time,” Haley claimed.
“I signed a bathroom bill in Florida, so that’s obviously not true,” DeSantis countered.
“What I always say is boys go in boys’ bathrooms, girls go in girls’ bathrooms,” Haley continued. “I also say that biological men should not play women’s sports, and I will do everything in my power to stop that because it is a women’s issue in our time.”
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
