GOP lawmakers to "permanently" ban gender-affirming care even after their own report supported ithttps://www.lgbtqnation.com/2026/01/gop-lawmakers-to-permanently-ban-gender-affirming-care-even-after-their-own-report-supported-it/ 🔗John Russell (6 Jan 2026)
Utah House Speaker Mike Schultz (R) says his Republican majority intends to permanently ban gender-affirming care for minors this year. The move comes more than seven months after the release of a Utah Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) report, mandated by a Republican-backed state law, which found that medical evidence actually supports access to gender-affirming healthcare for minors...
Utah already has what former state Rep. Mike Kennedy (R) — who now represents the state's third district in Congress — described to Deseret News as a "permanent" ban on gender-affirming care for minors.
S.B. 16 also ordered the state DHHS to commission a review of medical evidence around puberty blockers and HRT prescribed for the treatment of gender dysphoria in minors, with the goal of lawmakers using the report's findings to inform future policy decisions.
That review, conducted by the University of Utah's Drug Regimen Center, was released last May, and as Mother Jones reported at the time, its conclusions "unambiguously" supported the benefits of gender-affirming care for trans young people.
However, Utah Republicans, including Schultz, Kennedy, and state Rep. Katy Hall — who co-sponsored S.B. 16 — have dismissed the report.
"Common sense is common sense," Schultz told Deseret News. "I don't need a report, one way or the other, to tell me that. I just firmly believe that minors should not be transitioning."
