Rightwingers Gaslight Republicans, Wrongly Tying Darby to Transgender Ideology

But did Darby really vote in favor of State funding for gender transition surgeries for children?

Texas House Bill HB 1898 was passed this past session to provide funding for mental health services for Texas children’s hospitals. According to Rep. Jacey Jetton (TX-26), a Republican who wrote and sponsored the original legislation, the bill will finance children’s hospitals to provide services and a bed to any child who arrives at an emergency room after an attempted suicide or with suicidal thoughts. A children’s hospital is a hospital that is designated as such by the feds and does not file Medicare claims.

“This bill does not pertain to gender modifications of any type,” Jetton said during the House debate.

Jetton stressed to colleagues in the House during the floor debate that the bill was difficult to put together with many stakeholders. Any modification of the bill as it was would jeopardize its passage. The bill was sponsored by three Republicans and two Democrats. Darby was a cosponsor of the bill.

Jetton’s remarks were in response to Republican and Fort Worth Rep. Tony Tinderholt (TX-94) who introduced an amendment to HB 1898 that would prevent funding children’s hospitals that provide psychological or behavioral support for gender transitioning procedures. His amendment was one sentence long:

“The commission may not award a grant under the grant program to a children's hospital that provides services, medications, or procedures for transitioning a child's biological sex as determined by the sex organs, chromosomes, and endogenous profiles of the child or affirming the child's perception of the child's sex if that perception is inconsistent with the child's biological sex.”

Here is a snippet of the House floor debate on the Tinderholt amendment to HB 1898:

Tinderholt’s amendment was offered on April 18 and a little over a month later Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston was reeling from the passage of another piece of legislation that directly addressed and banned gender transition treatment for children. This was SB 14 that passed in the Texas Senate in late May (the companion House bill was voted out of committee on April 14 and passed the House on June 2). SB 14 was “Relating to prohibitions on the provision to certain children of procedures and treatments for gender transitioning, gender reassignment, or gender dysphoria and on the use of public money or public assistance to provide those procedures and treatments.”Texas Children’s CEO Mark Wallace said the passage of SB 14 and his decision to cease gender-affirming care of children because of this was “heart-wrenching.”

Darby didn’t only vote in favor of SB 14 but he was a coauthor and sponsor of this legislation. In addition, Darby voted in favor of and coauthored SB 15 that prevents biological males from changing their gender in order to compete against biological women in sports. Finally, Darby voted in favor of SB 12 that ceased sexualized drag queen shows (including transgender or promotions of gender transitioning) in front of minors.

On the day Tinderholt presented the amendment to the funding bill — HB 1898 — for children’s mental healthcare services at children’s hospital, his amendment failed to pass by a vote of 52 to 90. Six were absent or voted present. There were 26 House Republicans voting no. Then, after the vote was taken, 16 Republicans switched their votes to favor the Tinderholt amendment and two more Republicans switched their vote from absent to Yes. Instead not passing the amendment by a comfortable 52-90-6 margin, the margin narrowed to 70-74-4.

HB 1898 eventually passed in the House 128-6.

Macias is engaged in somewhat an insincere crusade against Darby and 10 other Republicans, claiming their vote against the Tinderholt amendment was akin to supporting State funding of gender change surgery for children. Rather than gaslight Republican voters, Macias should admit that the hard-crafted legislation HB 1898 was aimed to treat teen suicide but it was almost hijacked by his culture war hijinks.