House Passes First Bill to Ban Medical Mutilation Procedures for Minors

Over half of US states have already banned these interventions, but the US continues to lag behind other countries

The U.S. House of Representatives voted Wednesday to pass the Protect Children’s Innocence Act, marking the first time legislation banning medical mutilation procedures for minors has cleared the chamber.

The bill targets what many doctors describe as the “medical mutilation” of children—procedures referred to by gender activists as “gender-affirming care.” These include puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and transgender surgeries performed on minors. Evidence shows these interventions carry serious, irreversible consequences, including sterilization, sexual dysfunction, and long-term health risks such as heart problems, blood clots, and osteoporosis.

Meanwhile, as much as 98% of children who experience gender confusion outgrow it naturally if allowed to go through puberty without medical intervention.

Introduced by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), the Protect Children’s Innocence Act would make the medical mutilation of minors a Class C felony, punishable by up to 10 years in prison. The bill would also impose penalties on parents and others who help minors obtain such procedures.

The vote split largely along party lines, though there were exceptions. Three Democrats voted in favor of the bill, while four Republicans—Reps. Gabe Evans of Colorado, Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, Mike Kennedy of Utah, and Mike Lawler of New York—voted against it.

Greene said the vote only came to the floor after she agreed to support a procedural move advancing the annual defense policy bill on Thursday.

The House vote comes as the issue continues to reshape policy nationwide. More than half of U.S. states have already enacted laws restricting or banning medical gender procedures for minors, with some states also limiting residents from traveling elsewhere to obtain them.

Still, the US lags behind other countries such as Sweden, Finland, Norway, the Netherlands, and New Zealand, which have instituted restrictions on such interventions for minors. Even the United Kingdom, where citizens are arrested for criticizing gender ideology, has also halted these procedures for children pending further review.

In November, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services released a 410-page, peer-reviewed report on medical mutilation interventions for minors that flatly rejected the claims made by gender activists. The report concluded that assertions these procedures are “reversible” or demonstrably beneficial to children are false and unsupported by evidence. Gender confusion naturally resolves itself in nearly all children who experience it. Puberty blockers—gonadotropin-releasing hormone analogs in medical terms—interfere with that natural resolution, freezing normal development and locking children into the very distress they would otherwise outgrow, transforming a temporary phase into a permanent identity crisis and lifelong medical dependency.

Despite those findings and others, the bill’s passage sparked strong backlash from Democratic lawmakers and legacy media outlets, many of whom labeled it “anti-trans” and continued to falsely claim that the procedures are “medically necessary.”

“This bill is the most extreme anti-transgender legislation to ever pass through the House of Representatives,” the Congressional Equality Caucus said in a statement. “If this bill becomes law, doctors, pharmacists, and—in some cases—parents could face prison time for prioritizing their child’s health. Its passage will forever be a stain on the institution of the United States Congress.”

The bill will now proceed to the Senate.