While President-elect Donald Trump has yet to announce who will be at the helm of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), he has indicated several steps he would take to slash "gender-affirming" care for minors across the country.
In a video posted to Truth Social in February 2023, Trump said his plan "to stop the chemical, physical and emotional mutilation of our youth" would involve issuing an executive order directing all federal agencies to halt any programs that support or promote sex changes at any age.
"I will then ask Congress to permanently stop federal taxpayer dollars from being used to promote or pay for these procedures and pass a law prohibiting child sexual mutilation in all 50 states," Trump said in the video.
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Trump announced plans to ban any hospital or healthcare provider involved in gender-transition treatments for minors from participating in Medicaid and Medicare. He also pledged to support legal actions allowing affected individuals to sue doctors who performed these procedures on minors.
"The Department of Justice will investigate Big Pharma and the big hospital networks to determine whether they have deliberately covered up horrific long-term side effects of sex transitions in order to get rich at the expense of vulnerable patients," Trump added.
Trump honed in on transgender issues during the last leg of his campaign with a successful ad that focused on men in women's sports and Vice President Kamala Harris' track record of ushering in sex change procedures for incarcerated people in California.
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"Kamala is for they/them, President Trump is for you," the narrator of Trump's campaign ad said. Experts say the TV spot had a substantial influence on swing voters.
Over the last four years, the Biden-Harris administration used federal agencies, including the Department of Justice, to expand access to surgical procedures for minors. Under Biden, HHS created a regulation that interpreted "sex discrimination" within the Affordable Care Act to include gender identity and sexual orientation.
The expanded definition under Title IX meant that any medical provider not offering sex change procedures for any age was at risk of losing federal funding under the Biden-Harris regulation. The rule was blocked by the Supreme Court in August.
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In June, health officials in the Biden administration urged the international transgender health nonprofit, World Professional Association for Transgender Health, to omit the age limit in its guidelines for transgender surgical procedures for adolescents – and succeeded – according to unsealed court documents.
More than 25 states in the U.S. have enacted bans and restrictions on surgical procedures and hormonal prescriptions for transgender youth. Roughly 24 states still permit gender transition surgeries and drugs for children.
In recent days, Trump has been announcing his administration's appointments much quicker than he did during his first term. HHS candidates Fox News Digital has learned include Robert F. Kennedy Jr., former Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, Eric Hargan, former HUD Secretary Ben Carson, Seema Verma, Paul Mango, Joseph Ladapo, Roger Severino, Brian Blase and Joe Grogan.
Fox News Digital has reached out to the Trump-Vance transition team for comment.
