TN Senate Leader Credits Daily Wire Investigation For Inspiring Ban On Gender Procedures For Minors

Jack Johnson, the Republican Tennessee state Senate majority leader, told the New York Post that Matt Walsh’s investigation into Vanderbilt University Medical Center giving puberty blockers and hormones to children was the reason the state legislature passed a bill banning the life-altering procedures on minors.

The Tennessee law protecting children from puberty blockers and hormones is now before the Supreme Court with oral arguments beginning on Wednesday in the case United States v. Jonathan Skrmetti. Tennessee passed its ban on gender procedures on minors after Walsh revealed in 2022 that the pediatric transgender clinic at Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) performed double mastectomies and chemical castrations on gender-confused children.

Johnson said he’s “cautiously optimistic” that the Supreme Court will rule in the state’s favor after the Sixth Circuit of Appeals upheld Tennessee’s ban on puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and gender procedures on minors.

“Tennessee’s law that I sponsored will effectively be the test case for the nation. So we’re very excited, humbled, and cautiously optimistic that the Supreme Court will see it as the Sixth Circuit did,” Johnson told the Post.

“By no means would I be so presumptuous as to predict what the Supreme Court will do. I have tremendous respect for the court,” he added. “What’s at stake is effectively the rights of states to regulate these types of medical procedures.”

Just before Tennessee’s law went into effect in July of 2023, the Biden administration secured a preliminary injunction from the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee, which blocked the law.

“The science is unproven, it’s unsettled. The long-term ramifications of these types of procedures on kids is very unsettled, and in many cases, leads to very bad outcomes and potentially a lifetime of medical complications,” Johnson said.

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Walsh will speak outside of the Supreme Court at a rally put on by Do No Harm on Wednesday as justices hear arguments on the monumental case. The Daily Wire host, who has led a nationwide movement to protect children from gender procedures, said that a win at the Supreme Court would be another step toward a bigger goal.

“What gender ideology lacks in logic, science and morality, it makes up for in left wing money, violent activism, educational indoctrination, and legacy media support,” Walsh said Monday. “But we won’t stop working to protect children from this barbaric ideology. Once the Biden administration and trans activists are exposed at the Supreme Court, the next step is a nationwide ban on child sex-changes.”