Republicans at the West Virginia Legislature passed a bill that would allow health care providers to “visually or physically examine a minor child” for the purpose of identifying their “biological sex” without the “consent of the child’s parent, guardian, or custodian.”

The bill, S.B. 456, would define sex based on whether a person produces eggs or sperm. It says that gender-segregated spaces like locker rooms or restrooms are to be used based on a person’s sex assigned at birth, and it leaves no room for trans or nonbinary people’s identities. It also says that all intersex people are “either male or female” but does not give a basis for assigning a sex to them.

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West Virginia gov. signs gender-affirming care ban
Unlike similar bans, this one allows some youth to receive gender-affirming care.

The bill would have far-ranging effects, including on how transgender students are treated at schools. The text states that all multi-occupancy facilities like restrooms and changing rooms have to be designated as either exclusively for those assigned male at birth or those assigned female at birth.

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Yesterday, the West Virginia House of Delegates approved an amendment from Del. J.B. Akers (R) to allow a child’s “treating health care provider” to examine a child’s genitals without the consent of their parents. The amendment states that only the treating health care provider can perform such examinations without the parents’ consent. The amendment does not mention adults, and therefore presumably they could be forced to undergo such examinations by anyone.

The amendment was actually an improvement over a previous version of the bill, which, state Democrats argued, would have allowed teachers to perform the genital examinations.

Akers’ amendment was the Republican response to one proposed by Del. Kayla Young (D), which would have banned child and adult genital examinations altogether.

“It’s unconscionable that Republicans would support legislation that authorizes intrusive visual inspections of minors without parental approval,” Young said. “West Virginians should be alarmed and disgusted by this invasion of privacy.”

The state Senate passed S.B. 456 in a 32-1 vote last Monday, March 3. There are only three Democrats in the body; state Sen. Mike Woelfel (D) voted for the bill, state Sen. Joey Garcia (D) voted against it, and state Sen. Robert Plymale (D) was absent. On Friday, the bill passed the House of Delegates in an 87-9 vote.

The bill was then passed by both chambers again on Monday, March 7 with the amendment. It will now go to Gov. Patrick Morrisey (R) for his signature.

Yesterday, state Democrats – who control only 11 seats out of 100 in the House of Delegates – held a press conference to denounce the bill as well as several others that they say will harm children, including a bill to allow teachers to use corporal punishment and another bill that rolls back vaccine requirements for schools.

“While people sit around the dinner table looking at electric bills, that look more like what they used to take home in a month versus an electric bill, when we have coal mines that are shutting down because of saber-rattling in Washington over tariffs, when we have an unelected bureaucrat who’s firing federal employees that administer services that our people depend on – these are the types of issues that we are worried about?” Del. John Williams (D) said at the press conference, according to Real WV. “West Virginia has bigger problems and bigger fish to fry.” 

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