New gender law takes effect in April after Ohio lawmakers override DeWine’s veto

Ohio lawmakers voted Jan. 24 to override Republican Gov. Mike DeWine’s recent veto of legislation that bans certain types of medical or surgical gender reassignment procedures for minors who identify as transgender and also prohibits athletes from competing on sports teams corresponding with their self-perceived gender identity opposite their biological sex.

The Ohio Senate voted Jan. 24 to override DeWine’s veto of House Bill 68. The state’s House did so Jan. 10. The bill will become law, scheduled to go into effect in April, but it has a grandfather clause for minors already undergoing transgender treatments.

The Catholic Conference of Ohio said Jan. 24 it provided testimony in support of HB 68 in both the House and Senate, “emphasizing that experience of gender incongruence among young people are serious and individuals must be met with compassion, charity, and personal accompaniment without resorting to medical interventions that harm a developing body.”

“We are grateful to the Ohio House and Senate for prudently addressing these concerns through HB 68 and ensuring it becomes Ohio law,” the conference said.

In a Jan. 10 statement after the state House overrode his veto, DeWine stood by his decision.

“I continue to believe it is in the best interests of children for these medical decisions to be made by the child’s parents and not by the government,” he said.

Supporters of prohibiting surgical or hormonal treatments for minors who identify as transgender say such legislation would prevent minors from making irreversible decisions as children they may later come to regret as adults. Critics of such measures argue that preventing those interventions could cause other risks to minors, such as mental health issues or an increased chance of self-harm.

Similarly, supporters of prohibitions on athletes who identify as transgender competing on teams opposite their biological sex argue it would adversely affect women’s sports by allowing biological male competitors who may have an advantage over them in factors including weight and size. However, opponents of those measures argue such prohibitions are discriminatory to athletes who identify with a gender that is not their biological sex.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, that the override vote was “a shameful legislative act.”

“We will do everything we can to fight this,” the post said.

A 2022 study by the UCLA Williams Institute found there are approximately 1.6 million people in the U.S. who identify as transgender, with nearly half of that population between the ages of 13 and 24.

The Ohio legislation’s athletic component concerns a relatively small number of students. In April, Ohio’s NBC 4 reported that the Ohio High School Athletic Association found 19 biologically male youths, who identify as transgender, have participated in girls’ sports in the past eight years, among them six high school students taking part during the 2022-23 school year. The association said about 400,000 athletes in grades 7-12 participate in its sanctioned sports each school year.

In guidance on health care policy and practices released in March 2023, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Doctrine opposed interventions that “involve the use of surgical or chemical techniques that aim to exchange the sex characteristics of a patient’s body for those of the opposite sex or for simulations thereof.”

“Any technological intervention that does not accord with the fundamental order of the human person as a unity of body and soul, including the sexual difference inscribed in the body, ultimately does not help but, rather, harms the human person,” the document states.

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