JEFFERSON CITY, MO. — Within the coming weeks, laws restricting gender-affirming care for minors and prohibiting transgender girls from playing on female sports teams will go into effect.
Unlike other pieces of legislation, the governor did not hold a bill signing ceremony for the legislation. Our Missouri Chief Capitol Bureau Reporter Emily Manley asked the governor why he didn’t celebrate with the bills’ sponsors for one of his priorities.
The topic was the headline of session and when the legislation made it to Gov. Mike Parson’s desk, a Democratic senator asked for a few minutes of Parson’s time to discuss how he would go about signing the bills into law. The two said Thursday, it’s not that they agree on the topic, it’s that they had respect for each other.
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“I wanted to talk to him about the tone, either in an official release or a press conference, or just off the cuff to try to remind him as best I could that we’re talking about vulnerable kids here,” Sen. Greg Razer, D-Kansas City, said.
It was a priority for the governor, prohibiting doctors from performing surgeries and prescribing puberty or hormone treatments to minors and requiring transgender athletes to play on the team that aligns with the sex on their birth certificate. Parson told lawmakers if they couldn’t get the legislation to his desk during the regular session, to be prepared to come back for a specials session.
“The bottom line is, everybody knew I was going to sign it, so we were not going to make a big presentation up here for either side,” Parson said. “This is not about adults; I don’t have a problem with that. I have a problem when it comes to our children and I’m going to protect our kids at all costs.”
Last month, the governor’s office sent out a press release saying Parson signed the legislation, but there was no ceremonial bill signing, leading to people calling him out for hiding the bills behind closed doors.
“Everybody knew what was in that bill, everybody did and they knew when it made it to my desk the chances of me singing were highly likely,” Parson said.
That’s where Razer came in to play. The openly gay Kansas City Democrat stood for hours on the floor during debate to try and block the legislation. Instead, he became part of a compromise, allowing current patients to continue with treatment once the law goes into effect.
“Once the legislation had passed the Senate and the last week it passed the House of Representatives and was headed to the governor, I knew I wanted to try and get a few moments of his time to talk about the tone,” Razer said. “The governor has a big megaphone and I just wanted to make sure that the message was sent in a way that wouldn’t disturb these kids and the governor agreed.”
“My hats off to Greg,” Parson said. “He reached out to me and said he wanted to come and talk to me about this very issue and my job is to listen to him because I knew he was the leader of the other side per say in this building, so I wanted to hear his perspective too, and it’s not that we agreed when he left this office, but we both listened to each other.”
Razer said Thursday it was the governor’s idea to not hold a bill signing ceremony.
“He said, what if we just don’t have the big pump and circumstance of a bill signing ceremony that they have to see on TV and we’ll just sign it,” Razer said. “The governor said this is a good law, and I said this is tough for those kids and I don’t want to do anything that might push them over the edge.”
The two politicians, although on opposite sides of an issue, taking time to be considerate of one either, no matter blue or red.
“It’s okay to disagree and it’s okay to be friends with the people you disagree with, even vehemently disagree with,” Razer said. “I think it’s a story and a moment, even in the moment, it’s a shame people don’t see this. I hope that this story and think, that’s the way it’s supposed to work.”
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There’s been things voted on with people I haven’t agreed with but at the end of the day, my job as governor is the governor’s office, it’s not about Mike Parson, it’s about the governor’s office,” Parson said. “We aren’t going to agree on things but that doesn’t make you enemies, that doesn’t have to make you feel harsh towards one another or be mean towards one another.”
Senate Bill 39 requires transgender athletes to compete on sports teams with their sex assigned at birth. The Missouri State High School Activities Association (MSHSAA) said there are eight trans student athletes who been approved through their policy, four competing at the junior high level and four at the senior high level.
Missouri is joining more than a dozen states in restricting or banning access to puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones or gender-affirming surgery. Senate Bill 49 would also Medicaid patients due to the state prohibiting any funds from covering gender-affirming care in Missouri and surgery will no longer be available to inmates and prisoners.
Under the legislation, the ban for puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones will expire in four years, but the ban on gender-affirming surgeries is permanent. Doctors who treat patients in violation of the law would be subject to professional discipline and civil liability.
The two laws go into effect Aug. 28.