After a first decree protecting women, the American president targets medical treatments for transgender minors – a decision that could have a global impact.
This piece was originally published in French on 30 January 2025.
Donald Trump has issued a second Executive Order on gender ideology and this time he is protecting children. On Monday, I commented on his previous decree, in which he set out to protect women, but questioned why he was silent on young people who are arguably even more vulnerable. It seems that Trump was merely taking his time to get it right.
This latest missive could not be clearer. The president started as he meant to go on,
“Across the country today, medical professionals are maiming and sterilizing a growing number of impressionable children under the radical and false claim that adults can change a child’s sex through a series of irreversible medical interventions. This dangerous trend will be a stain on our Nation’s history, and it must end.”
PROTECTING CHILDREN FROM CHEMICAL AND SURGICAL MUTILATION
EXECUTIVE ORDER
January 28, 2025
As a result, the United States Government will no longer “fund, sponsor, assist or support the so-called “transition” of a child from one sex to another. That is powerful language. Something does happen when someone transitions – other people relate to them differently, for example – but nobody can change sex. Trump is right about that and he is right to use the word, sex. For too long, the word “sex” has been substituted with the word “gender” in law and policy in English speaking nations. To an English speaker, the word “gender” is sometimes synonymous with the word “sex” and sometimes not. The resulting confusion has obfuscated reality.
Children have been lied to when they were told that clever medicine can change them from a boy to a girl, or from a girl to a boy. That is simply not possible, and the treatments on offer – drugs to disrupt their natural puberty, and surgeries to remove healthy body parts from minors – should never have been allowed in the first place. Unfortunately, in the United States those procedures have proliferated.
The latest Executive Order defines children as anyone under 19 years old. That is important because children do not leave school on their eighteenth birthday. They need to be protected throughout their final year in high school. Arguably the protections should be extended further. Humans do not reach full psychological maturity until around age 25. Perhaps the protection of young adults will be included in next week’s Executive Order? It should be!
However, all individuals under the age of 19 will be protected within the scope of the President of the United States’ authority. That is limited by the federal nature of the US, where individual states can make their own laws. Trump might be able to withhold federal funding from states, but he cannot direct them. But money talks all the same.
Medical institutions throughout the US have been put on notice. Every hospital and medical school that receives federal research or education grants must end the “chemical and surgical mutilation of children”. Meanwhile, new legislation is proposed to support young people who have suffered those procedures in the past. They – or their parents – will be able to take legal action against hospitals and medical professionals who have harmed them. The Executive Order suggests a lengthy statute of limitations on that action. After all, the consequences of what has been sugar coated as “gender affirming treatment” can also last a lifetime.
Among further welcome developments, federal agencies must stop relying on guidance from the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH), which the United States government deems to lack scientific integrity. Instead, it mandates a review of existing literature on best practices for children experiencing gender dysphoria. Among other studies, the Cass Review of gender identity services for children and young people in England has moved the debate on from the wishful thinking of activists that was lapped up by WPATH.
On this side of the Atlantic, thinking has already moved on. British children, for example, can no longer be supplied with puberty blockers. But the influence of America is strong in Europe, and this Executive Order protects confused and vulnerable youngsters who might previously have wistfully looked west. Harm is harm and protections in one part of the world protect children throughout the world.
By Debbie Hayton
Debbie Hayton is a teacher and journalist.
Her book, Transsexual Apostate – My Journey Back to Reality is published by Forum
* This article was first published in French by Le Point on 30 January 2025: Trump passe à l’action contre la « mutilation » des enfants en transition.
Debbie Hayton 
8 replies on “Trump takes action against the ‘mutilation’ of children”
This isn’t as hopeful as it sounds. First of all, Trump’s reputation is poor, and he is seen by most as being autocratic, immature, partisan and foolish. Second, once he is out of office, transgender ideology will most likely swoop back in like a wave. Third, he may not have the legal authority to ban gender-changing procedures. The courts are likely to rule against him, favoring medical organizations and pro-transgender parents. In other words, Trump and his associates are already seen as being backwards and illegitimate on many of their policies and actions, and this is just another such policy.
It pains me to say this, but transgender ideology may have already gotten a permanent hold in the United States. Like, say, lobotomies, the efficacy of which were discredited probably 65 to 70 years ago, but which remain legal, transgender ideas and treatments may remain legal for decades to come for any children and parents foolish enough to want them, and for foolish doctors to use as they see fit. The level of pity for those poor screwed up transgender people is just too high, and “affirmative care” still seems to be the obvious go-to treatment. The “tough love” that is needed to allow children to outgrow their feelings just doesn’t exist. Parents and children want instant solutions.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Caleb, I respectfully disagree. Trump will take this before Congress. It will become law. He ran and won on this ticket. People now have the courage to stand up and say no to this vile agenda. There is a sick and very insidious cabal behind this disruption of society and biology.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think that real change will only come when de transitioners start successfully taking the medical establishment to court.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Pauline, I think you have a very good point here!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I agree with a lot of what has been said here. I think Trump is right on this issue and his EO to protect children is welcome news. That said, I still wouldn’t trust him and I worry greatly about his other policy positions.
LikeLike
Didn’t the U.S. Congress just vote on trans women in women’s sports (last week, I think) and didn’t ALL of the Democratic senators vote to support trans women in women’s sports? As long as all liberal politicians remain in favor of it, it’s going to be hard to defeat.
Now, this article is about treatments of trans children, not trans women in women’s sports, but the solidarity of the Democrats is concerning. Liberals still see trans children as the ost pitiful of all human minorities, and they are convinced that affirming care is the only way to go. In my case, though, I see children as being stronger than most people think. If they are told they must wait until adulthood to begin transitioning, I think they will do it.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think it is a tragedy that so many in the Democratic Party have abandoned common sense, and overlooked policy that has put children at risk.
LikeLike
In order for ALL liberals to support trans women in women’s sports, they must all support a trifecta of ideas: That trans women’s advantages are small over normal women. That women are such a large group that it will affect them negligibly. And that the skewing of sports records ultimately won’t matter. But for tournaments and races in which there can be only a single winner, all it takes is one remarkable athlete to defeat the entire field. In fact, Lia Thomas shows that the athlete doesn’t need to be remarkable at all, but only as good as your average man. I had believed that the spectacle of Lia Thomas defeating all those women was going to finally resolve the issue, but it didn’t. What Thomas showed was that s/he had no shame to be such an unfair competitor.
LikeLiked by 1 person