Montana Lawmaker's Bill Would Charge Parents Of Trans Kids With Child Abuse

Montana courts overruled a trans health care ban in 2023, but it’s making a comeback—the latest in state Republicans’ war on the judiciary branch.

Senator John Fuller - Montana Public Records//Montana Legislative Broadcast Feed

For the fifth time in three years, Montana State Senator John Fuller has introduced legislation targeting transgender youth. The State Supreme Court overturned a similar law sponsored by Fuller in 2023; its renewed form may indicate the GOP’s plans for reconstructing Montana’s judiciary branch in favor of conservatism. Other prior iterations of the bill simply failed to pass. Now, he’s got his eyes set on a new target: parents of transgender kids.

Introduced on Wednesday, January 22, Senate Bill 164 would criminalize gender-affirming care—such as surgeries, puberty blockers, and hormone replacement therapy—for trans patients younger than 16 years old under child abuse statutes.

“Every major medical association in America endorses the provision of this type of care,” the ACLU of Montana’s executive director Akilah Deernose said. “This bill would mandate government overreach into private decisions that should remain between families and their treating care physician.”

Fuller, the bill’s sponsor, has a lengthy track record of trying—and failing—to enact anti-trans laws. In 2021, as a member of the Montana House, he introduced two separate bills targeting medical practitioners providing gender-affirming care for trans people, neither of which ever made it out of the legislature. He was also the architect of a ban on trans women in sports (trans men were not mentioned) that the Montana Supreme Court in part overturned in 2022.

Fuller’s 2023 version of the youth health care bill passed in the state’s House and Senate. Republican Governor Greg Gianforte signed it into law, only for state courts to deem this, too, “unconstitutional”—citing Montanans’ right to privacy.

This time, instead of a flat-out ban, Fuller’s bill reclassifies medical treatments for trans young people under Montana child abuse statutes. It specifically targets treatments “altering the appearance” of a child that seek to “affirm[. . .] the child's perception of the child's sex when the appearance or perception is inconsistent with the child's biological sex.”

If the bill becomes law, Montana would be the first state in the country to explicitly criminalize parents simply for allowing a child access to gender-affirming procedures and hormone therapy.

Half of all states have already passed legal restrictions on health care for trans youth. The Oklahoma state legislature considered, but ultimately did not pass, a similar bill criminalizing parents of trans kids in 2021. Texas Governor Greg Abbott also issued a directive requiring state social services to investigate parents who let their trans children access gender-affirming treatments — however, like that of many states targeting this kind of care, the policy was blocked by the courts for violating the constitutional rights of trans people and their families.

Unlike Montana Senate Bill 164, Texas’s directive did not outright criminalize parents who support trans kids; it required an investigation, but not necessarily punishment. The only policies that have withstood the test of the judiciary thus far have targeted health care providers and state funds rather than parents, and they hang in the balance of an ongoing SCOTUS case. If Montana’s bill is passed, it could lay the groundwork for a dangerous legal precedent.

Studies have also shown that anti-trans health laws can create a medical chilling effect, impeding health care for people of all gender identities, as doctors could restrict or deny care if they even suspect a young person is or could eventually identify as trans.

Including Fuller’s proposals, Montana faced at least 10 anti-LGBTQ bills in 2023 alone. Hundreds of anti-trans bills at the state and national levels have been introduced or gained headway since then.

Fuller’s latest attempt to implement this policy in spite of the Supreme Court’s decision is more than just political theater. In addition to attacking trans kids’ access to health care, a Fuller-led coalition of Montana Republicans has set its sights on the judiciary branch. Legislators have proposed an onslaught of bills to constrict, discredit, and declaw the courts, limiting its scope and capacity for judicial review—including several bills introduced on the same day as Senate Bill 164. One such policy would remove the court’s power to accept lawyers into the bar association and instead give the ability to the governor.

The Supreme Court of Montana is selected through nonpartisan elections, where candidates cannot run under a party banner. Fuller and his allies want to change that. Only six states currently utilize partisan judge elections. And the Center for American Progress found that “partisan elections lead to more campaign contributions and increased partisanship among judges.”

According to ACLU of Montana lobbyist Henry Seaton, the efforts could amount to a power grab by the state GOP.

“One working theory is that if they are able to pass partisan judicial races, they feel that the court system will rule these unconstitutional bills more in favor of them,” Seaton said.

These efforts may be uniquely potent in Montana, but the strategy is on par with a playbook politicians are using across the country. A report from the Brennan Center for Justice found that, in 2023, there were 124 bills in 29 states “attacking the independence of courts.” The bills covered a spectrum of legal avenues that would “inject more politics into how judges are selected,” such as by allowing “judge-shopping,” enabling legislatures to cherry-pick judges for certain cases.

A December 2024 document by Fuller addressed a myriad of partisan complaints that Republicans in the Montana legislature levied against the judiciary branch. Co-signed by over a dozen Republican state legislators, the letter alleges that “the Montana Supreme Court has a long history of hostility toward the Republican Party and conservatives.” They also allege that the bar association endorsed “implicit attacks” on Republicans when a member of a private legal practice, speaking at a bar association panel, criticized the GOP and referred to Governor Gianforte as “Governor Gianforeskin.” Neither the state bar association nor Fuller’s office provided comment in time for publishing.

Laws disempowering state judiciaries could jeopardize the supposed neutrality of the courts. Mississippi, for example, enacted a 2023 law that would have “singled out” voters in a majority-Black district by creating new, state-appointed judgeships, while voters in the rest of the state would elect their judges.

The Mississippi Supreme Court overturned that law.