President Biden signed the National Defense Authorization Act yesterday, which included a provision stripping health care for the trans children of military personnel. The $895 billion bill was primarily focused on funding the military and increasing pay, housing and childcare for military personnel. However, right-wing members of Congress, led by House Speaker Mike Johnson, inserted the anti-trans provision, which says that treatment could “result in sterilization.”
The moved forced Democrats to choose between objecting to the overall aims of the bill, which they wanted, and the anti-trans provision. Democrats attacked the measure during the Senate debate on the bill, but were unable to get the provision removed. Ultimately, the bill passed with wide bipartisan support.
In signing the bill, the first anti-trans legislation to pass Congress in years, Biden singled out the provision targeting trans youth as something he “strongly opposes.”
“This section undermines our all-volunteer military’s ability to recruit and retain the finest fighting force the world has ever known by denying health care coverage to thousands of our service members’ children,” Biden said. “No service member should have to decide between their family’s health care access and their call to serve our Nation.” Some family members had said that they will consider leaving them military if the provision became law.
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Democratic Rep. Mark Pocan, head of the Congressional Equality Caucus, excoriated Johnson for his success. “Today, Speaker Johnson got one of his top priorities signed into law,” Pocan said. “Not something to curb the rising cost of groceries—no, it was a restriction on necessary medical care for the children of those serving our nation.”
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