Ohio Senate overrides DeWine vetoes on trans youth gender-affirming care.
The Senate voted 24-8 to override DeWine’s veto of House Bill 68, which blocks gender-affirming care for trans youth and prevents transgender athletes from playing women’s sports. The bill also prohibits transgender youth from starting hormone therapy and puberty blockers.
A three-fifths majority vote from the members of the House and Senate is necessary to override the governor’s veto. The Ohio House voted to override HB 68 earlier this month. State Sen. Nathan Manning of North Ridgeville was the only Republican to vote against overriding the Republican governor on the gender-affirming care ban.
The laws are set to go into effect 90 days after they are delivered to the Secretary of State’s office, meaning it would likely take effect April 23.
“There are men and there are women and there are boys and there are girls and they are different,” said State Sen. Kristina Roegner, R-Hudson.
“Gender is not fluid. There is no such thing as a gender spectrum,” she claimed.
State Rep. Gary Click.
The bill’s author state Rep. Gary Click, R-Vickery, has denied that HB 68 has any religious backing, but Click can be heard saying in a recorded sermon from 2018 that trans people break from God’s plan for the family.
“You’re not born that way,” Click says about trans people during the sermon. “God’s not going to curse you in the wrong body. He’s not going to curse you with desires that cannot be adequately and appropriately and biologically fulfilled correctly.”
Click is a pastor at Fremont Baptist Church and celebrated Wednesday’s Senate vote.
“The SAFE Act and Save Women’s Sports Act are the civil rights issues of our day, ensuring that children have the right to grow up intact and that women are no longer subject to men invading their spaces,” he said in a statement.
House Bill 6, which prevents trans athletes from playing Ohio women’s sports, was rolled into HB 68 during the summer.
“It’s too bad that House Bill 68 and House Bill 6 were combined into one piece of legislation because the only commonality these two pieces of legislation have is they both target the same small portion of transgender kids,” said State Senator Kent Smith, D-Euclid.
Twenty-three states have passed similar laws in regards to transgender athletes since 2020, according to ESPN.
Currently, if a trans girl wants to play on a team with cis girls in Ohio, she must go through hormone treatments for at least one year or show no physical or physiological advantages, according to the Ohio High School Athletic Association.
There were only six transgender high school female student athletes in Ohio, the Capital Journal previously reported in the spring.
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