WATCH — Psaki: ‘Transgender Kids’ Not a ‘Kitchen Table’ Issue

White House press secretary Jen Psaki attacked Republicans from the briefing room Thursday, saying that they are targeting “transgender kids” and denying them “life-saving” medical care. She said transgenderism was not a “kitchen table” issue.

Psaki opened her remarks by criticizing a bill in the Alabama state legislature that bans life-altering drug treatment or surgery to transgender minors. It is similar to legislation in other states and does not affect the medical choices of transgender adults.

Psaki said:

Across the country, as we’ve talked about a bit in here, Republican elected officials are engaging in a disturbing, cynical trend of attacking vulnerable transgender kids for purely partisan political reasons. Today, in Alabama, instead of focusing on critical kitchen table issues like the economy, COVID, or addressing the country’s mental health crisis, Republican lawmakers are currently debating legislation that, among many things, would target transgender youths with tactics that threatens to put pediatricians in prison if they provide medically-necessary, life-saving health care for the kids they serve. Just like the extreme government overreach we’ve seen in Texas, where politicians have sent state officials into the homes of loving parents to investigate them for abuse just to harass and intimidate the LGBTQI+ community, today’s vote in Alabama will only serve to harm kids. Alabama’s lawmakers and other legislators who are contemplating these discriminatory bills have been put on notice by the Department of Justice and the Department of Health and Human Services that laws and policies preventing care that health care professionals recommend for transgender minors may violate the Constitution and federal law. To be clear, every major medical association agrees that gender-affirming health care for transgender kids is a best practice and potentially life-saving. All of this begs an important question: what are these policies actually trying to solve for? LGBTQI+ people can’t be erased or forced back into any closets, and kids across the nation should be allowed to be who they are, without the threat that their parents or their doctor could be imprisoned simply for helping them and loving them. President Biden has committed in both words and actions to fight for all Americans and will not hesitate to hold these states accountable.

Psaki did not say how old a child had to be before deciding he or she was transgender, or how old he or she had to be before qualifying for drugs or surgery to reassign or “affirm” their gender, or whether parents should have to consent beforehand.

The recent book Irreversible Damage by Abigail Shrier documents how many schools and doctors are providing drugs and mastectomies to minor girls who have decided they are transgender men, often without the informed consent of parents.

Contrary to Psaki’s claim that “partisan politics” is the only motivation behind laws such as the Alabama bill, most bills appear to be motivated by concern for the safety of children. Recent polls suggest parents of both parties are concerned about teaching young children about sexuality and gender, and bipartisan majorities support laws to restrict such instruction.

Psaki also celebrated the Senate’s confirmation of Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. His recent book, RED NOVEMBER, tells the story of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary from a conservative perspective. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.