From Pharmacists to Therapists, Florida Could Prosecute “Aiding And Abetting” Trans Youth Care If New Bill Passes
These bills can be weaponized against providers or schools based on “suspicion, politics, or grievances from ideological extremists.”
The anti-trans bills passed in the Florida House and Senate this week—SB1010 and HB743—are groundbreaking for a few reasons, all of which have activists on the ground sounding the alarm bells and rallying the troops.
Described by activists as the “The More Lawsuits for Teachers & Doctors Bills,” the proposal opens up any health-care practitioner who “aids and abets” a minor pursuing gender affirming care to legal liability. And the bill’s vague and undefined standards embolden Attorney General James Uthmeier to further antagonize trans Floridians, their families, and the doctors who provide them with life-saving care.
The bills passed in both House and Senate committees on Tuesday, with one Democrat—Senator Darryl Ervin Rouson—joining Republican colleagues to vote in favor of the measures, as per the committee vote record.
A policy brief from Equality Florida, shared with Erin in the Morning, argues the bills’ “deliberately” vague language could expose nearly every healthcare worker, from lab techs to therapists, to civil liability or even felony charges for routine care—like counseling, drawing blood, or filling a prescription.
It also targets anyone who is “an employee of the state.” This most notably applies to public school teachers under the guise of “parental rights” over everything from class curriculums to acknowledging a trans student’s name and pronouns.
The lack of guardrails or clear standards also invites selective enforcement—enabling the AG to antagonize providers or schools based on “suspicion, politics, or grievances from ideological extremists,” Equality Florida said.
Furthermore, the bills establish private causes of action, allowing trans patients and their families to sue doctors for physical and “emotional” damages with a statute of limitations as high as 20 years. Fines could be as high as $100,000 per count; the mere threat of such extensive legal liability is enough to cause some professionals to withdraw care completely.
“Never before has state law threatened even mental health support for transgender youth, like the sweeping and ambiguous language of this bill could,” said Jon Harris Maurer, Public Policy Director of Equality Florida. “Lawmakers continually seek to replace parents, doctors, and therapists in caring for these minors.”
While the focus is indeed on youth, the medical chilling effect of bills like this impacts everyone.
Vance Ahrens, a trans Floridian and Navy Corps veteran, spoke out against the bill at the hearing. A mother and grandmother, she’s struggled to access gender-affirming care due to increased regulations in the state, including those imposed on adults.
Florida law now requires that gender-affirming care be provided only by a physician, in-person, with a signed consent form. This strips nurse practitioners and telehealth providers of their ability to offer such care.
It might seem like innocuous red tape—but in practice, it causes serious disruptions. And that’s the point.
“I saw a nurse practitioner for my care in 2023 and lost that access,” Ahrens told Erin in the Morning. “One of the doctors I was able to get an appointment with just before the bill became law called and canceled my initial appointment because they were no longer providing gender-affirming care.”
Similar bills have been passed in other states too, including Arkansas and Indiana. But in some ways, Florida’s “aiding and abetting” law is uniquely poised to empower one person, activists say: Attorney General James Uthmeier, who has used his seat to target dissidents and stoke fear to the point of overcompliance.
The DeSantis appointee has become a leading innovator in using the office of the AG to chip away at Floridians’ human rights and liberties. Most notoriously, he was the architect behind the newly-established concentration in the Everglades, dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” for migrant detainees.
Meanwhile, his attacks on trans rights have been a convenient excuse to bolster the powers of the Attorney General, according to some critics.
During this week’s House hearing, Democratic Representative Kelly Skidmore eviscerated the “aiding and abetting” bill—and Uthmeier—in no uncertain terms.
“This bill,” she told the House, “is about giving a person who misappropriated somewhere between 10 and $35 million of taxpayer money—and I’m being kind—additional authority to go after physicians.”
The Chair attempts to interrupt her, but Skidmore bites back.
“This is a terrible bill,” she said. “It is about empowering an individual who doesn’t deserve it. Everyone should vote ‘no.’”
Even though the bill made it through committees, there’s still a long way to go before the bill becomes a law. The fight isn’t over—a final vote is yet to come.
 | A guest post by
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It is imperative the people engineering, funding, and carrying out the propaganda campaign and enacting the laws and policies against transgender people must face 42 U.S.C. § 1983, 18 U.S.C. § 241, & 18 U.S.C. § 242 prosecution. We can't just eventually win an election and be safe from them, they have to be imprisoned, and fined, and deprived of the privilege of seeking office, until the Social Conservatives are as politically dead as the Whigs and Know Nothings.
Florida’s SB1010 and HB743 don’t “protect children.”
They criminalize care, silence educators and counselors, and terrorize LGBTQ+ youth and their families.
These bills turn doctors into felons, teachers into targets, and kids into political weapons.
They weaponize the state against evidence-based medicine, free speech, and basic human dignity.
This is government overreach at its most dangerous: punishment instead of care, fear instead of facts, ideology instead of rights.
Florida lawmakers should reject SB1010 and HB743 and stop legislating cruelty.
Children deserve safety, privacy, and support — not prosecution and stigma.