Kentucky lawmakers vote to ban taxpayer funds for trans surgeries, lift ban on ‘conversion therapy’

Taxpayer-paid trans surgeries won’t be happening in Kentucky if state lawmakers have their way.

In late-night votes right before the state’s legislative session closed March 14, the Republican-led House passed bills banning prisoners from receiving sex change operations and Medicaid from paying for transgender surgeries, the Lexington Herald-Leader reported.

The state had 67 inmates who identified as transgender as of January, according to testimony before lawmakers. Sex change surgeries cost around $50,000, according to factcheck.org.

Both measures were previously approved in the Senate, sending them to Gov. Andy Beshear.

Beshear, a liberal Democrat, vetoed a ban on child trans surgeries in 2023 that the Legislature then overrode. That measure also banned sex education in elementary schools and prohibited discussion of gender identity, gender expression or sexual orientation at all grade levels, according to Louisville Public Media. 

Tuesday, Beshear vetoed the Medicaid measure, HB 495, which also would have reversed the state’s ban on “conversion therapy,” or any effort by counselors to affirm minors’ biological sex instead of their so-called “gender identity” or sexual orientation. 

Even so, the Legislature should have enough votes to override: The House approved the Medicaid legislation 67-19 and the Senate also voted by a wide margin, each exceeding the two-thirds threshold necessary for a veto override.

Beshear had signed an executive order in September banning state or federal funds from therapy or counseling that seeks to sway children from their adopted gender identity or address its root causes. 

Advocates of the counseling ban say it’s cruel to dissuade children from their adopted identity. But proponents point to studies showing most children outgrow their feelings of gender dysphoria if they are allowed to go through puberty and mature. 

They also point to irreversible harm done by chemical and surgical sex changes. 

Kentucky’s therapy ban is similar to one in Michigan, which is being challenged in court. That state’s Catholic Charities and a Lansing counselor sued Gov. Gretchen Whitmer last year in protest of the “conversion therapy” ban. 

Becket, a religious liberty law firm, is appealing a federal trial court’s adverse ruling in January to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. 

Earlier this month, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to take up a case challenging Colorado’s conversion therapy ban. The case will be heard when the court’s next session begins in October.  

The high court’s decision will impact more than 20 states that have banned such counseling.