March 17 marks the tenth anniversary of homosexuals marching under their own banner in New York City’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade. When the decision was reached in September 2014 that gays could march in 2015, Bill Donohue pulled the Catholic League contingent from ever marching again. He did so because he was double-crossed—he was lied to by senior parade officials.

In late August 2014, Donohue was asked by John Fitzsimons, a lawyer and parade organizer, if he would object to including a gay group marching in 2015. Donohue, who was acting as the PR point man for the parade for 20 years, said it would be okay provided they made a formal change in the rules, and they included a pro-life group to march.

The latter was important because Donohue had been telling the media for decades that gays and pro-life people have always been free to march in the parade; they just could not do so under their own banner. He was assured that would happen. On September 3, 2014, Donohue issued a news release about this development.

On September 4, William O’Reilly, the parade’s spokesman, said that only one gay group (affiliated with NBC) would march. A few hours later, John Lahey, president of Quinnipiac University and vice chairman of the parade, announced that other gay groups could also apply to march.

On September 9, Donohue issued a statement about three new gay groups applying to march. He took a shot at Lahey for opening the door and for implying that a pro-life group might not be included.

On September 11, Lahey made it official. When asked if a pro-life group would be allowed to march, he said, “That won’t be happening.” That same day, Donohue released a statement titled, “We Will Not March.”

This ugly chapter started only two weeks after the 2014 parade.

On April 1, 2014, Lahey sent a letter to the directors of the parade citing pressure from the corporate and collegiate elite. Heineken, Guinness, Manhattan College, Fairfield University, the Irish government, and the Ford Motor Company were threatening to pull their role in underwriting the costs of televising the parade on NBC. The latter found an ally in Frances X. Comerford, parade organizer and chief revenue officer for NBC. Irish Central also played a role in pushing for gays to crash the parade.

We had the law on our side, and the people on our side. It was corrupt members of the ruling class that lied and sold us out.

To this day, the Catholic League is the only group to pull its contingent from marching.

Bill Donohue

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel released a report in December on sexual abuse in the Diocese of Lansing. It is seriously flawed, though she received no pushback from the media; they accepted the report at face value. We did not, and with good reason: Nessel’s animus against the Catholic Church is indisputable (see our website for the evidence).

This is the fourth diocesan report on this subject: reports on the dioceses of Marquette, Gaylord and Kalamazoo were previously issued. The Lansing report found that there were 56 diocesan officials who were accused of sexual abuse between the 1950s and the 2010s. Unlike most probes on this subject, this one includes alleged adult victims as well as minors.

The alleged offenders include one male teacher, three religious brothers and 52 ordained clergy (four deacons and forty-eight priests). Of the 56, two-thirds are dead. Of the one still in active ministry, the allegation was found to be unsubstantiated by the diocese.

The report found that two-thirds of the alleged victims were males; a quarter were females; the rest targeted males and females. Most of the cases took place during the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.

Our review of Nessel’s report found serious mistakes that inflated the total number of alleged victims and deflated the number of male victims.

• The report lists alleged male and female victims as John Doe and Jane Doe, respectively. There were 120 John Does and 42 Jane Does listed. However, there were also 40 other alleged victims in the report who were not listed as either John Doe or Jane Doe. Of the unlisted, 37 were male and three were female.
• The report lists several instances where there is no mention of a John Doe, yet they are still included in the tally. For example, there is no record of John Doe 30 nor of Jane Doe 10.
• In some cases, the report lists Jane Doe where the victim was male. Also, in one case Jane Doe was not a victim, but rather the wife of a male who alleged abuse. In another case, a Jane Doe was a sibling of a John Doe but did not claim she was abused.

Why would the report inflate the total number of alleged victims and deflate the number of male victims? It is obvious to any honest scholar who has covered this issue—to protect homosexuals from scrutiny. For decades now there has been a persistent cover-up of the role that homosexual priests have played in the clergy abuse scandal (see my book, The Truth about Clergy Sexual Abuse). The guilty parties include the media, government officials, educators and activists.

Another serious problem with the report is that it disregards the Diocese of Lansing’s records on abuse cases. Of the 56 accused in the report, only 21 are listed in the Diocese of Lansing’s credibly accused list (Nessel’s report relies heavily on data reported on the website of bishop-accountability.org, which is hardly a reliable source).

Upon investigation, the Lansing diocese found that many of the accusations were not deemed to be credible: It is not easy to substantiate accusations about alleged offenses that took place decades ago. In several cases, the Diocesan Review Board could not find any evidence of abuse. In four cases, the accused passed a polygraph exam. Yet they were still included in the report!

Attorney General Nessel is not interested in curbing sexual abuse. If she were she would stop stalking the Catholic Church and start probing the public schools. That’s where this problem is on-going.

USA Today reporters investigated all 50 states to see how they handle the sexual abuse of students. They gave Michigan an overall grade of “F.” They said its background system was “weak” and was “left to local school districts.” Also, mandatory reporting laws were determined to be “weak.” In terms of transparency, they found “no information online about teacher disciplinary actions and misconduct.” To make matters worse, information on teacher misconduct was “not shared with other states.”

There is plenty here for Nessel to mine. It’s time for her to investigate public school kids who have been abused in the past, as well as those currently being raped by teachers.

Also, since Nessel did not confine her probe to minors who have allegedly been abused by priests and other staffers, an examination of sexual misconduct in the public schools must include an investigation of teachers, administrators and other school personnel who have been accused of molesting or harassing other adults, including the parents of their students.

We are contacting every lawmaker in the state to do what should have been done a long time ago: insist on a probe of sexual misconduct in the public schools. It’s time to stop religious profiling and treat every segment of society equally.

Contact Nessel: [email protected]

Bill Donohue

When Playboy reigned supreme—before the age of internet porn—it was regarded as the choice girly publication of the urbane set. It had essays, poems, book reviews, interviews with celebrities, music reviews, and the like. It was said that only 10 percent of the magazine featured pictures of naked gals. But everyone knew that guys didn’t buy Playboy because of the other 90 percent.

Similarly, there are many outstanding artistic elements to “Conclave,” the movie about the election of a new pope, but does anyone really believe that it would be heralded as a great film if it weren’t for the ending? That’s when we learn that the newly elected pope has a uterus.

Last weekend “Conclave” won the top prize at the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards, and this weekend it is up for Best Picture at the Oscars; it previously beat all competitors at the British Academy Film Awards (BAFTA).

Movie makers in the USA and the UK want desperately to see the Catholic Church become more “modern.” This is code for Protestanizing. But married priests, women priests, and a soft—if not welcoming—approach to homosexuality, abortion and gender ideology has not exactly been a home run for the mainline denominations. Indeed, they are in free fall. Most important, it is precisely because they decided to become “relevant” that they are crashing.

Secularists may not have noticed but orthodoxy sells. This is as true for Catholics as it is for Protestants and Jews.

Why does Cardinal Vincent Benitez, who becomes the new pope in “Conclave,” have a uterus? Because he’s a freak? No, because those associated with the film want Catholics to think outside the box and become more accepting of heterodoxy. In other words, they want Catholics to reconsider the wisdom of Church teachings.

In an honest review in the Washington Post, Monica Hesse understands what’s going on. “Perhaps the film’s point is the Benitez’s identity as an intersex individual is going to radically inform everything he does, which is, in turn, going to radically change the Catholic Church. It would be impossible for Benitez not to be transformative to the church, because he has been transformed himself.”

Of course, he could have been a force for radical change had they depicted him as transgender, but intersex is sexier and much more provocative. Transgender is getting old.

Now some reviewers, such as Dana Stevens at Slate, see the movie’s ending to be more of a last minute flip of the switch. She sees it as “an eleventh-hour plot device to make the audience say, ‘whoa! in unison, rather than a subject of reflection and discussion.” Similarly, Nick Schager at the Daily Beast said the big revelation at the end “lands with a hilarious thud.”

That means the movie’s point was lost.

It appears that the desired outcome—to jar the public, especially Catholics—to change their mind about the Church’s teachings on sexuality and welcome a pope with a uterus—is not getting through. When the audience giggles, it’s a sure sign they failed to receive the memo. That’s why the movie is a flop.

Bill Donohue

Some individuals are their own worst enemy. Some will admit that they shouldn’t be taking drugs, while others confess that they eat, drink, smoke and spend too much. But they continue anyway. And then they die.

The same is true of political collectivities. After being badly beaten in the November election, many of the losers are digging their heels in, apparently learning nothing. They have already succeeded in rendering liberalism intellectually bankrupt, and now they are well on their way to destroying the Democratic Party.

The following is a random selection of news stories that were recently published.

Two-thirds of Israelis support President Trump’s plan to take over Gaza. But American Jews, who voted overwhelmingly against Trump, are a bit more divided. Some of those who don’t support the Trump plan, which is being promoted by the Israeli government, are not content to disagree—they are demonizing Trump. A column in the Jewish Forward compares the relocation plan to the Nazis. A full-page ad in the New York Times, signed by hundreds of rabbis—accuses Trump of “ethnic cleansing.”

It is striking that those who are closest to current conditions in Israel are applauding Trump, while those who are wholly unaffected are comparing him to Hitler.

One of the top issues driving Trump’s mandate was immigration. The public wants the illegals out. But in many cities run by the Democrats, they are resisting cooperation with ICE. Even the Dallas chief of police wants illegal aliens to stay; he has pledged not to cooperate with the ICE deportation plan.

The most vociferous resistance to Trump’s agenda is coming from the sexually confused, the mentally challenged, and their supporters. These people falsely believe that males who identify as female are, ipso facto, female. They not only find it acceptable for males to compete against females in sports, and to share locker rooms with them, some even defend the distribution of pornography to children in the schools.

Regarding the latter, parents in a school district in Rochester, New York objected to putting a book on display in the library that showed homosexuals in bondage gear, drag queens, and naked men and women. It was accessed by a fifth grader and is readily available to kindergarten students. The school board wouldn’t even allow parents to speak about this at a recent meeting, even though it is a modern-day expression of child abuse.

Every sane person knows there are only two sexes—male and female—but when a Trump order acknowledged this verity on the website of the Department of Health and Human Services, a federal judge intervened and assumed control. Another federal judge accused the Trump administration of showing an animus against transgender persons. Why? Because of an executive order that bars these persons from serving in the military.

A top school official in Maine wants boys to compete with girls, and to shower with them, which is why he objected to Trump’s executive order to “keep men out of women’s sports.” Not to be outdone, the City Council in Worcester, Massachusetts voted to declare the city a sanctuary city for “transgender and gender-diverse people.” It also compared the Trump administration to the Nazis.

Harvard Medical School is so upset with Trump’s cutbacks that it is recommending students to comfort themselves by attending “pet-therapy sessions,” programs that allow attendees to “pet and play.” They even offer six therapy animals to play with, including “Hermie the therapy guinea pig.”

This is how we are preparing tomorrow’s elite fleet of doctors. Imagine if they freak out while doing heart surgery? Will they give Henry the Hamster a hug? Why not just grow up and get a stiff drink?

Who is supporting this madness? Democrats.

A Gallup poll of Democrats found that half (49 percent) of self-identified Democrats consider themselves to be liberal, and that 45 percent of them want their Party to become more liberal; 22 percent want it to stay the same. Which means that more than 7-in-10 have learned nothing.

Some people never learn. What is really perverse about this is that the dumbest among them are also the ones who have stayed in school the longest, people who are typically—but erroneously—considered to be well educated.

No one has done a better job addressing modern-day child abuse than Sen. Josh Hawley. Bill Donohue explains why more needs to be done.

 February 24, 2025

Hon. Josh Hawley
115 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510

Dear Senator Hawley:

The bill you introduced last month, “The Jamie Reed Protecting Our Kids from Child Abuse Act,” would allow minors who were harmed by sex-transition procedures to bring lawsuits against those who participated in this abuse. This is commendable but more needs to be done.

To be specific, the role played by the medical schools, the American Medical Association and other professional associations needs to be addressed. They provide legitimacy for these acts of child abuse.

The medical watchdog, Do No Harm, reports that in a five-year period, 2019-2023, approximately 14,000 children underwent sex-change operations. There is big money in this scam—the hospitals charged nearly $120 million. They have the support of elite medical schools, the AMA, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Psychological Association and the American Psychiatric Association.

Mass General is the original and largest teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School. It has a specialized gender-affirming care unit. Surgeries include the creation of a vagina and a penis. Boston Children’s Hospital is also a teaching hospital at Harvard Medical School; it operates “the first pediatric and adolescent transgender health program in the United States.”

Other medical schools that do the same work include Johns Hopkins, Stanford Medicine, the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, the Columbia University’s Vagelos College of Physicians & Surgeons, the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, Yale Medicine and the Duke University School of Medicine.

While all of these institutions matter, the AMA is the most influential. What it professes is alarming: “Designating sex on birth certificates as male or female, and making that information available on the public portion, perpetuates a view that sex designation is permanent and fails to recognize the medical spectrum of gender identity.”

Self-identification is no substitute for biological truisms. There are but two sexes—male and female—and no amount of chatter about “the medical spectrum of gender identity” can change this verity. Quite simply, what the AMA professes is anti-science.

Given its commitment to subjectivism, it is not surprising to learn that the AMA supports transgender persons joining the military. Regarding children, it has a policy that says “Exclusionary Bathroom Policies Harm Transgender Students.” This means that boys who claim to be girls should be free to shower with girls. It also believes that male prisoners who falsely claim to be female should be housed in women’s prisons, no matter how violent the men are.

You have done yeoman work. Please consider expanding your reach to address the damage that the AMA is doing.

Sincerely,

William A. Donohue, Ph.D.
President

Bill Donohue

On his first day in office, President Trump issued an executive order declaring there are only “two sexes, male and female.” It says a lot about our society that this even has to be said. This same phenomenon—denying the existence of human nature and Biology 101—exists throughout western civilization. At bottom, this is a war against God. It is a war the deniers cannot win.

Those promoting the fiction that there are an endless number of sexes, which they incorrectly call genders, are overwhelmingly rich, white, liberal, secularists with postgraduate degrees. No wonder it is their children who are the most likely to call themselves something other than male or female. (For more on this, see my book, Cultural Meltdown: The Secular Roots of Our Moral Crisis.)

The latest Gallup poll shows that 9.3 percent of Americans now identify as “LGBTQ+” persons. This is in stark contrast to what the Trump administration is doing. The National Park Service recently changed the Stonewall National Museum website to only refer to lesbian, gay and bisexual, hence the designation LGB.

This upset Kathy Hochul, the Catholic governor of New York; she said it was “cruel.” No matter, transgender people have been eliminated. To be frank, they never existed (sex is binary). Also, the “Q” is redundant and the “+” is plain dumb.

Gallup tells us that 1.4 percent of Americans say they are lesbians; 2.0 claim to be gay; 5.2 percent identify as bisexual; 1.3 percent believe they are transgender; there are a few other odd categories. Among the so-called LGBTQ+ population, Gallup found that 56.3 percent identify as bisexual and 13.9 percent believe they are transgender.

Who are the most likely to claim they belong to this population? Young people, girls, Democrats, liberals, and those who live in cities or the suburbs. Why is this not surprising?

In the 12 years that Gallup has been tracking this issue, those who identify as “LGBTQ+” has tripled. This suggests that this phenomenon has everything to do with culture, not biology. To put it simply, we are witnessing the queering of America.

If anyone doubts that this is a culturally induced condition, consider that young people in California are 40 percent more likely to identify as transgender than the national average. It is not a coincidence that California is one of the most liberal states in the nation.

Transgenderism is flowering in colleges for the same reason. Liberal professors, most of whom are militant secularists, are indoctrinating their students with this mind-altering poison.

At Brown University, four in ten students (38 percent) say they are “LGBTQI+.” The “I” stands for intersex, which is another fiction. While it is true that there is a rare disorder that allows for both male and female genitalia, all of those people are intrinsically male or female—there is no third form.

Between 2010 and 2023, the gay and lesbian population increased by 26 percent, and the percentage identifying as bisexual increased by 232 percent. Those identifying as “other sexual orientations” within the so-called LGBTQ population increased by almost 800 percent.

These people are in serious need of professional help, making the parents of prospective college students wonder whether they should consider enrollment in a community college or a trade school. Why send your kid to an Ivy League school where he may come home at Thanksgiving giving thanks to his discovery that he is a girl?

Fortunately, the Trump administration is not putting up with this madness.

On February 19, The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued an official statement defining sex as an immutable biological classification of male or female. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. explained, “This administration is bringing back common sense and restoring biological truth to the federal government. The prior administration’s policy of trying to engineer gender ideology into every aspect of public life is over.”

HHS defines a female to be “A person of the sex characterized by a reproductive system with the biological function of producing eggs (ova).” Accordingly, it defines woman to be “An adult human female.” (Are you listening Ketanji Brown Jackson?) A male is defined as “A person of the sex characterized by a reproductive system with the biological function of producing sperm.” Accordingly, it defines man as “An adult human male.”

This may come as a shocker to the Washington Post—it published an incredibly irresponsible piece on the same day of the HHS ruling denying that sex is binary—but to most Americans not drugged with ideology it makes perfect sense. The newspaper continues with the fiction that “Sex is widely understood to refer to a label assigned at birth,” when, in fact, it is simply recorded at birth. No one “assigns” our sex—it is determined exclusively by our father and can be detected in utero.

The queering of America serves no legitimate interest. It only serves to encourage the agenda of severely addlepated men and women, as well as those who are profiting from them either ideologically or financially.

The following letter explains the Catholic League’s interest in getting to the bottom of anti-Christian bias in the federal government.

February 19, 2025

Hon. Pamela Bondi
U.S. Attorney General
U.S. Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, D.C. 20530-0001

Dear Attorney General Bondi:

I am delighted that President Trump has established a Presidential Commission on Religious Liberty, and that you have been appointed to head a task force on anti-Christian bias. We will do everything we can to assist you in this effort.

The Catholic League has more documentation on this issue than any organization in the nation. We are currently collecting documents for you to make it easier to access our work; we will be sharing this with you when the process is complete. Please see our website, catholicleague.org, for detailed news releases, essays and reports on anti-Christian bigotry.

It would be helpful if you could identify someone with whom we can work with in this endeavor. Please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Sincerely,

William A. Donohue, Ph.D.
President

Gender Identity

“President Biden has long promised that he would be an advocate for the LGBTQ community should he be elected president. Now, just hours into his presidential term, Mr. Biden’s White House website allows users to choose their pronouns, a change that drew swift praise from advocates. As part of the website revamp that occurs during presidential transitions, the White House changed its contact form. The form now allows individuals to select from the following list: she/her, he/him, they/them, other, or prefer not to share. Those who select other also have the option to write-in what pronouns they use. People can also choose which prefix they use: Mr., Ms., Mrs., Dr., Mx., other, or none.” (CBS News, “Biden administration allows users to choose their pronouns on remastered website”, January 20, 2021)

In August, the department rolled out new guidelines titled, ‘Updated Department Guidance Regarding Transgender Employees in the Workplace’ and mandates that all employees and applicants should be addressed ‘by the name, pronouns, and honorific (Mr., Mrs., Ms., Miss, Mx., etc.) that they themselves use in everyday interactions, and as they choose to communicate to their supervisor/manager and colleagues.’ ‘Continued intentional use of an incorrect name, pronoun, and/or honorific – also known as misgendering – could, depending on its severity and pervasiveness, contribute to a hostile work environment allegation, and constitute misconduct subject to disciplinary action, up to and including separation or removal,’ the guideline states.” (“GOP Sen. Ted Budd demands State Department roll back requirement for employees to use preferred pronouns” Fox News, October 23, 2023)

“The EEOC’s newly proposed guidance similarly includes ‘Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity’ as the basis for prohibited ‘sex-based discrimination’ under Title VII and asserts that ‘sex-based harassment includes harassment on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, including how that identity is expressed.’ ‘Harassment,’ according to this guidance, includes epithets and physical assault as well as ‘intentional and repeated use of a name or pronoun inconsistent with the individual’s gender identity (misgendering).’ Also included as a form of harassment is ‘the denial of access to a bathroom or other sex-segregated facility consistent with the individual’s gender identity.'”  (“The EEOC is trying to make ‘misgendering’ a thought-crime” The Hill, October 8, 2023)

“‘All employees should be addressed [by] the names and pronouns they use to describe themselves,’ an HHS email sent to employees and shared with CNA read. The mandate is part of the department’s new Gender Identity and Non-Discrimination Guidance, which was established to outline ’employee rights and protections related to gender identity,’ according to the email.” (“Biden Health and Human Services Imposes Trans Pronoun Mandate on Employees” National Catholic Register, October 12, 2023)

“An internal U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) memo obtained by the Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project and shared with Fox News Digital prohibits agents from using ‘he, him, she, her’ pronouns when initially interacting with members of the public. ‘DO NOT use ‘he, him, she, her’ pronouns until you have more information about, or provided by, the individual,’ reads the memo obtained by Heritage via Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).” (“CBP memo orders agents not to misgender ‘members of the public”’ Fox News, November 22, 2023)

“The transgender policy deployed by Interior leadership in September urges employees to ‘use gender-neutral language in broad communications to avoid assumptions about gender identity.’ Examples of ‘pronouns,’ according to the policy, are ‘they, them, theirs, ze/hir/hirs, ze/zir/zirs, xe/xem/xyrs.’ Bathroom use is up to personal discretion, it says, and those who refuse to abide by departmental policies are warned of retribution for ‘unlawful discrimination.’ ‘Repeated, intentional refusal to use the employee’s affirming name/gender/pronouns, and/or repeated reference to the employee’s dead name/gender/pronouns by supervisors/managers, or coworkers is contrary to the goal of treating all employees with dignity and respect,’ the policy states. ‘Such intentional conduct could constitute unlawful discrimination.'” (“Interior Department Transgender Policy Threatens Employees Who Won’t Play Along With Fake Pronouns”, The Federalist, December 21, 2023)

“The USDA issued a May 12, 2022, memo stating how it planned to comply with a Biden executive order issued on Jan. 30, 2021, to prevent discrimination on the basis of gender identity and sexual orientation..The May 2022 memo on Biden’s executive action also called for developing ‘gender-inclusive language in agency internal and external communications,’ to include ‘the proactive use of pronouns in the workplace.’ It also included a plan to ‘update USDA Style guide for email signatures and business cards to include and encourage pronoun use.'”  (“EXCLUSIVE: Biden Admin Adds LGBTQ Strings to Foreign Agriculture Grants” Daily Signal, January 9, 2024)

“The Federal Reserve conducted diversity, equity, and inclusion trainings in which staff members learned that ‘correct pronoun usage is a civil right’ and were told to acknowledge their ‘white privilege,’ documents obtained by the Washington Free Beacon show. The Fed held at least four DEI training sessions in the spring and summer of 2021, the documents reveal. During the training sessions, staffers learned to use ‘inclusive language,’ like ‘Latinx,’ and were shown an illustration of a transgender gingerbread man that could have a woman’s brain and male reproductive organs. Staffers were also told to refer to Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell as ‘chair,’ an example of ‘gender-inclusive language.'” (“Federal Reserve Staff Underwent DEI Training Amid Rising Inflation, Documents Show”, Washington Free Beacon, January 10, 2024)

On April 30, 2024, the Biden-Harris administration implemented a new rule to use the foster care system to advance the radical LGBT agenda. This rule lays the groundwork to seriously undermine parental rights and religious liberty.

Background

In 2016, the Obama’s Health and Human Services (HHS) provided a five year $10 million grant to researchers at the University of Maryland to establish a center to support LGBT children in foster care. The researchers went on to work with child welfare agencies to develop strategies to ensure “affirming” placement of LGBT youth. As part of the grant, the researchers developed the National Quality Improvement Center on Tailored Services, Placement Stability and Permanency for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Questioning, and Two-Spirit Children and Youth in Foster Care (QIC-LGBTQ2S).

To implement this program, the researchers turned to agencies in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Prince George’s County, Maryland, and the state of Michigan. Of these four locations, Cuyahoga County would serve as a key linchpin in crafting the Biden-Harris administration’s foster care rule.

Programs

Cuyahoga County implemented the “AFFIRM.ME” model. This included four interventions: “Safe Identification Initiative,” “Youth Acceptance Project,” “Chosen Affirming Family Finding,” and “AFFIRM Caregiver.”

These programs would provide the foundation of the Biden-Harris administration’s foster care rule.

“Safe Identification Initiative“

This intervention requires all children over the age of 13 to participate in a conversation with their caseworkers about their sexual orientation and gender identity and expression (SOGIE). In some instances, children as young as three-years-old discussed their SOGIE status with caseworkers.

During the course of these conversations children were asked pointed questions. “Do you have crushes on boys, girls or other kinds of people?” and do you “feel more like a boy or more like a girl, some other gender or maybe somewhere in between?” were the types of questions that were put to the children.

“Youth Acceptance Project“

The goal of this intervention is to help parents and caregivers of children already in the system or at risk of entering the system to become affirming of their children’s SOGIE status. It specifically targets parents and caregivers who do not allow their children to wear hairstyles and clothing of the opposite sex or fail to use “preferred pronouns.”

The Youth Acceptance Project has already been implemented in California, New York, Pennsylvania, Missouri, and Ohio.

“Chosen Affirming Family Finding“

This intervention aims to place LGBT youths with people who “affirm” their SOGIE status. While this may mean placing the youth with an “enlightened” relative who supports the LGBT creed, the placement does not have to be blood kin. Frequently teachers and LGBT activists known to the child (often the person that encouraged him to embrace the rainbow cult) are given custody of the child simply because they are more “affirming.”

“AFFIRM Caregiver“

This intervention attempts to increase the number of “affirming” homes available to LGBT youth. Potential foster parents must take a test designed to ascertain their ability to create a “safe space,” while another form asks how strongly they would support behaviors associated with different gender identities. Additionally, they are asked if they would “display pro-LGBTQ+ symbols” at home or allow their foster child to bring a “same-gender significant other to family events and celebrations.” These questionnaires trample all over the parents’ religious liberty rights and weed out those that are not “affirming” enough.

Rule Making Process

Drawing on the “research” from the Obama administration’s grant, the Biden-Harris HHS was able to create its new rule regarding affirming homes for foster children. In fact, Julie Kruse, a senior adviser at HHS, had closely monitored the work of the agencies that received funding through the grant. Of particular interest was Cuyahoga County, and Kruse had several meetings with people at that agency. For one of these meetings the Cuyahoga County team put on a presentation explaining why its program was “a promising model for replication.”

To ensure support for this radical rule, the Biden administration turned to other activists for input. One of these activists was Alex Roque, who runs the Ali Forney Center catering to homeless LGBT youth in New York. During a webinar hosted by HHS, Roque declared that “transphobia is child abuse.” Roque went on to liken denying a child’s SOGIE status to denying them food and access to school.

Another LGBT agency that provided insight for developing the rule was Family Builders. In its public comment, Family Builders argued that offering religious exemptions was a granting a “license to discriminate and to do harm.”

In addition to relying on these “experts” for the development of the rule, the Biden administration also promotes their work in its implementation. The rule requires that to become a “designated placement” for LGBT youth, foster parents must “be trained with appropriate knowledge and skills to provide for the needs of the child related to the child’s self-identified sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression.” Although the rule does not specify what trainings are to be used, the website for the Administration of Children and Families Children’s Bureau (part of HHS) directs people to training resources developed by many of these same experts that were funded through the QIC-LBTQ2S.

Future Implications

Ultimately this rule lays the foundation for declaring a parent’s lack of “affirmation” as a form of child abuse. This would then justify taking children away from their parents and denying Catholics and other faithful Americans from serving as foster parents.

In Prince George’s County, Maryland, parents lost custody of their son, who has autism, after staff at Children’s National Hospital in Washington, DC, told them he was transgender. This came as a surprise to the Christian family as the son had never displayed any transgender tendencies before his stay in the hospital. Unsurprisingly, one of the boy’s councilors was an LGBT activist. The hospital forced the parents to jump through multiple hoops to regain custody of their son compelling them to take the matter to court. According to the parents’ lawsuit, hospital officials told them to “remove passages from their Bibles that affirm traditional sexual values” and refused to release their son until “they renounced their lifetime faith.”

In Montana, a family lost custody of their daughter after a stay in a local hospital. The girl informed the hospital that she believed she was a boy and insisted on being called “Leo.” Although Montana prohibits transgender procedures for minors, hospital staff informed the parents that “social transitioning” was a “grey area” and that was the best course for their daughter. When they refused to comply, Department of Children and Family Services (CFS) and hospital staff berated the parents. Within hours of being assured their daughter would be transferred to a comprehensive care facility in Montana, the girl was sent to a facility in Wyoming, which did not have the same safeguards in place to protect minors from gender affirming care. After her stay in Wyoming, CFS put the girl in a group home. Although her parents tried to regain custody, the girl remained in temporary legal custody of CFS until the girl’s biological mother, who has a history of physically harming children, was given custody.

In California, a mother lost custody of her daughter after being accused of emotional abuse for not allowing the girl to bind her chest or wear men’s clothing. The daughter was taken away to live in a foster home and the mother was disqualified from continuing her career as a Christian counselor. After several months of fighting in the courts, the mother cleared her name and regained custody of her daughter. Social workers required the mother to take the girl to the Los Angeles LGBT Center for LGBTQ+ youth. However, the mother believed that the center was not helping her daughter as it made the girl more rebellious and defiant. When the mother told her daughter she would have to arrange her own transportation to the center, social workers threatened the mother again with losing her daughter for emotional abuse. Ultimately, mother and daughter left California after the girl, at the age of 17, received a prescription for testosterone without her mother’s consent.

In Ohio, parents lost custody of their daughter when social workers argued that their lack of support for her SOGIE status made the girl suicidal. The girls grandparents were given custody because they “are the ones who have an open mind and will…make this sort of decision best for the child.”

In Vermont, Michael and Rebecca Gantt along with Brian and Kaitlyn Wuoti served as foster parents. Between the two families they adopted five children. Both men are pastors in their churches, and the families hold traditional views. For years, both the Gantts and the Wuotis received top marks from state officials for the care they provided. However, when it came time for the families to renew their licenses, both were denied because they would not abandon their faith and embrace Vermont’s anti-scientific proclamations regarding the ability to change their sex.

Given the confidential nature of juvenile court and custody proceedings, there are probably many more instances of parents losing their rights. Vernadette Broyles, president and general counsel of the Child and Parental Rights Campaign, warns “what the Biden administration and HHS has been putting out there as guidance for states, there’s no question in my mind that this is happening in a substantial way.”

• When no intervention is made 70% of children with gender dysphoria will grow out of it on their own.

• The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) lists eight conditions that are associated with gender dysphoria in children. A child is diagnosed with this condition if they meet six of them. They are:
—A strong desire to be of the other gender or insistence that one is the other gender
—A strong preference for cross-dressing or simulating [other gender] attire
—A strong preference for cross-gender roles in make believe play or fantasy play
—A strong preference for the toys, games, or activities stereotypically used or engaged in by the other gender
—A strong preference for playmates of the other gender
—A strong rejection of toys, games and activities typically associated with birth sex
—A strong dislike of one’s sexual anatomy
—A strong desire for the primary and/or secondary sex characteristics that match one’s experienced gender

• Most of the adolescent girls claiming to be transgender did not show any signs of these conditions in childhood. Further, social media can influence and coach these girls to say they meet the DSM-5 criteria for gender dysphoria and begin their treatment.

• The BBC reported on a study that showed some children taking puberty blockers reported an increase in thoughts of suicide and self-harm.

• “It showed that after a year on puberty blockers, there was a significant increase found in those answering the statement ‘I deliberately try to hurt or kill myself.'”

• A study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine “found that 80 percent of gender minority students report having mental health problems, nearly double the rate of ‘cisgender’ students.”

• Renowned psychiatrist, Paul McHugh, said, “I believe that these gender confusions are mostly being driven by psychological and psychosocial problems these people have.”

• Professor Lisa Littman, a researcher at Brown University published a report “suggesting that some transgender-identified children might suffer from ‘rapid onset gender dysphoria,’ a phenomenon in which ‘one, multiple, or even all of the friends [in a group] have become gender dysphoric and transgender-identified during the same timeframe.” She believes that transgender identity is a social contagion. Littman hypothesized three things worked as the contagion:
—The belief that non-specific symptoms should be perceived as gender dysphoria and that their presence is proof of being transgender
—The belief that the only path to happiness is transition
—The belief that anyone who disagrees with the self-assessment of being transgender or opposes the plan for transition is transphobic, abusive, and should be cut off

• According to Littman’s study:
—Over 80% of the adolescents were natal females, with a mean age of 16.4.
—Most were living at home with their parents when they announced they were transgender.
—The vast majority had zero indicators of childhood gender dysphoria, and universally they failed to meet six of the criteria the DSM-5 requires to diagnose a child with gender dysphoria.
—A majority had had one or more psychiatric diagnosis and almost half were engaging in self-harm prior to the onset of gender dysphoria.
—41% had expressed non-heterosexual sexual orientation before identifying as transgender.
—47.4% had been formally assessed as academically gifted.
—Nearly 70% of the teenagers belonged to a social group in which at least one friend came out as transgender, and in some groups the majority of the friends had come out as transgender.
—Over 65% of teens had increased their social media use and time spent online immediately prior to the announcement of transgender identity.
—Among parents who knew their children’s social status, over 60% said the announcement brought a popularity boost.
—Over 90% of parents surveyed were white.
—Over 70% of parents surveyed had earned bachelor’s or graduate degrees.
—Over 85% of parents reported supporting the rights of gay couples to marry.
—Over 88% of parents surveyed reported being supportive of transgender rights.
—Nearly 64% of parents had been called “transphobic” or “bigoted” by their children for such reasons as: disagreeing with the child about the child’s self-assessment as being transgender, recommending that the child should take more time to figure out if the child’s feelings of gender dysphoria persisted, calling the child the wrong pronouns, telling their child that hormones or surgeries were unlikely to help, calling their child by his or her birth name, or recommending that the child work on other underlying mental health issues before undergoing medical transition.
—Fewer than 13% of parents believed that their adolescents’ mental health had improved after transgender identification, and over 47% reported that their mental health worsened.

• A study published by the American Academy of Pediatrics found that “More than half of transgender male teens [girl to boy] who participated in the survey reported attempting suicide in their lifetime, while 29.9 percent of transgender female teens [boy to girl] said they attempted suicide. Among non-binary youth [those who identify as neither], 41.8 percent of respondents stated that they had attempted suicide at some point in their lives.”

• In a paper published by the American Journal of Psychiatry it was reported that “sex-reassignment procedures—both hormonal and surgical—do not bring the promised mental health benefits.”

• The authors point out that on one score—treatment for anxiety disorders—patients who had sex-reassignment surgeries did worse than those who did not. “Individuals diagnosed with gender incongruence who had received gender-affirming surgery were more likely to be treated for anxiety disorders compared with individuals diagnosed with gender incongruence who had not received gender-affirming surgery.”

• The study in the American Journal of Psychiatry also found that transgender individuals who had received a diagnosis of gender incongruence were:
—six times more likely to have a mood or anxiety disorder than the general population.
—three times as likely to be prescribed antidepressants and anti-anxiety medications.
—more than six times as likely to attempt suicide resulting in hospitalization.

• Therapists usually practice gender affirmation. In other words, if a girl thinks she is a boy, therapists believe it is in the best interest of the child to affirm this. There is little evidence to suggest that this approach actually resolves the issues of gender dysphoria. Further, this approach is usually adopted without parental consent.

• Gender therapists tend to believe that adolescents know who they are. Rather than working to resolve underlying conditions that may cause gender dysphoria, they take the minor’s word as fact, and begin a treatment regiment based on what the adolescent believes.

• Gender therapists will essentially hold parents emotionally hostage by informing them that if they do not embrace their adolescents’ beliefs about gender dysphoria then their children will kill themselves. Rather than actively working to end self-harming behavior, therapists will use it to push the adolescents further down the path to transitioning.

• Gender therapists generally believe that gender identity is immutable and there is no way to convert a child out of a transgender identity. So instead of helping children move past their gender dysphoria, as they would 70% of the time without intervention, therapists believe there is no alternative to embracing the identity and moving forward with transition procedures.

• Many have described the transgender community, particularly its online presence, as a cult. They will constantly push one another further down the path of transition in the pursuit of a more genuine and authentic transgender lifestyle. Frequently, in social media postings, transgender influencers praise one another for how hardcore they are as they mutilate their bodies. Anyone perceived to have reservations about taking the plunge risks being perceived as less committed to the lifestyle, and not fully onboard.

• A 2020 study conducted by Britain’s National Health Service found a relationship between increased media coverage of transgender issues and rising number of teenagers, primarily girls, requesting sex changes. Journalists glorify medical transitions and present them to adolescent readers of celebrity publications as a solution to depression, anxiety and panic attacks. This is very appealing to adolescent girls, who traditionally have higher degrees of depression and anxiety than their male counterparts and were more adversely impacted by social isolation during the lockdown.

• During the isolation of lockdown, anxiety and depression grew in many girls. Last year, they followed an increasingly familiar pattern of rapid-onset-gender-dysphoria. It typically starts by transgender activists on Reddit, Tumblr, and YouTube promoting a transgender identity as a cure to all their problems. This then leads to the girls forming a new gender identity which schools then eagerly affirm. Any objections are treated as “transphobic.”

For a glossary of terms, click here.