The Assembly voted along party lines to send a bill defining a broad avenue for patients to sue practitioners who provided them gender-affirming care as minors.
The bill now goes to the governor.
SB 405 creates a civil cause of action for individuals who receive gender-affirming care before the age of 18 to sue their medical provider for physical, psychological or emotional injuries.
Democrats criticized the bill as an attack on transgender people meant to score political points.
>> WisPolitics is now on the State Affairs network. Get custom keyword notifications, bill tracking and all WisPolitics content. Get the app or access via desktop.
Rep. Andrew Hysell, D-Sun Prairie said the bill sought to create a double standard for gender-affirming care under medical malpractice statutes. He noted it lacked caps on some damages and allowed for a much longer statute of limitations than other malpractice lawsuits.
He said this was to discourage practitioners from offering this care.
“You’re not trying to keep people safe from negligent care, you’re trying to eliminate that kind of care,” Hysell said.
Republicans, in turn, accused Democrats of pushing “detransitioners” into the shadows and covering for practitioners motivated by profit rather than their patients’ best interest.
“SB 405 says children are not science experiments. It says they are not collateral damage for a multi-billion dollar industry, and it says that medical professionals must be held to the same level of care here as in pretty much every other area of medicine,” said Rep. Amanda Nedweski, R-Pleasant Prairie, who sponsored the bill in the Assembly.
Also passing along party lines was SB 277, which would require state agencies to seek reauthorization for rules they oversee every seven years.
