On December 17, 2025, H.R. 3492, the “Protect Children’s Innocence Act” passed the House of Representatives with 216 votes.

This bill addresses the recent unevidenced practice of convincing distressed young people—particularly autistic children, victims of childhood sexual abuse, and children who are likely to grow up to become lesbian, gay, or bisexual adults—that their distress is caused by their “gender identity” being incongruent with their body, and that changing the way their body looks will alleviate that distress.

If this bill passes the Senate, it will make it a federal crime to knowingly perform sex-trait modification procedures on minors on the basis of the minor’s “gender identity.” This includes removing girls’ breasts, removing ovaries or testicles, inverting boys’ penises, attaching rolled-up skin to girls’ genital areas to make it look like they have a penis, any plastic surgery that makes them look more like the opposite sex, administering puberty blockers, and administering too much of a hormone that the opposite sex has more of. It also imposes similar penalties for female genital mutilation, including the possibility of up to 10 years imprisonment.

Far from “never happening,” according to insurance claims filed between 2019 and 2023, 5,747 minors had surgery to change their sex characteristics in the United States. A full 10% of those were performed in New York hospitals. This number is likely an undercount, because doctors performing these procedures often commit insurance fraud by filing the wrong code.

While opposing this practice is often seen as conservative, there are also many left-leaning, liberal, feminist, centrist, or nonpartisan groups working to protect children from “gender”-motivated medical harm. ROAR Women NYC, for example, is a nonpartisan, lesbian-founded group actively working to restore lesbian advocacy and spaces in NYC. We object to surgically modifying the sex characteristics of children not only because they can’t consent, not only because childhood discomfort with sex often resolves without needing hormones or surgery, but because medicalizing gender non-conformity in children started as and is still a form of gay conversion therapy.

Especially because many of our elected representatives ignore our legitimate and evidence-based human rights concerns, we welcome efforts by the federal government to end the widespread medical harm of children.

How did your Representative vote?

1. Look up your Representative here by entering your zip code. Click through. You will see your representative on the left-hand side, next to the map.

2. Search their name in this list to find out how they voted. Most Democrats voted against the bill, while most Republicans voted for it.

In particular, if your representative is Henry Cuellar [D-TX], Donald Davis [D-NC], or Vincente Gonzalez [D-TX], make a special effort to thank them! These are all Democrats who read the writing on the wall and chose to protect children.

If your representative is Gabe Evans [R-CO], Brian Fitzpatrick [R-PA], Mike Kennedy [R-UT], or Michael Lawler [R-NY], those are all Republicans who voted against the bill. They might find it helpful to hear from constituents with a strong enough understanding of the issue to properly convey its importance.

3. Contact them! Go back to the website that gave you your Representative’s name. You can contact them by clicking the envelope under their party affiliation.

We’ve provided a template to get you started! Fill in the bracketed information yourself, and feel free to add whatever other information or context you want.

Dear Representative [Your representative's name],

I am your constituent, and I am grateful for the passage of H.R. 3492, the Protect Children's Innocence Act. [Add background about your political leanings, voting history, etc.]

Aside from the obvious fact that children cannot consent to procedures that impact their sexual function for life, I am aware that multiple systematic reviews have found that so-called "gender-affirming care" has no proven benefit, while the lifelong harm it causes to people who receive it is well documented.

I have been following recent efforts by the federal government to protect children from this form of predatory malpractice, including measures by HHS, CMS, the FTC, the DOJ, and the FDA to expose and curtail the widespread harm these procedures have caused.

[If this issue has impacted you or someone you know personally, mention it.]

[Thank them for voting to protect children—or ask them to rethink their position.]

The longer we let providers profit from convincing children hormones and surgeries are the silver bullet to resolving their distress, the more children are left permanently altered, and the more people realize it doesn't work the way they were told. I hope your future votes reflect that you grasp the seriousness of the issue.

Sincerely,
[Your Name]