DeWine vetoed House Bill 68 on Friday, which would have prohibited doctors from prescribing puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones for minors and banned boys from competing in girls’ sports, just hours before the deadline. A review of donations from 2018 to 2023 found that the governor received $40,300 from the Ohio Children’s Hospital Association (OCHA), Cincinnati Children’s, Nationwide Children’s Hospital and ProMedica Children’s Hospital, all of whom support transgender medical care.

OCHA donated $10,000 to the Mike DeWine and Jon Husted Transition Fund on Dec. 28, 2018, and another $10,000 on Dec. 7, 2022, according to the report. A transition fund allows candidates to spend donations for “transition activities and inaugural celebrations,” according to Ohio’s campaign finance handbook.

Cincinnati Children’s, an affiliate of OCHA, donated $300 on Dec. 15, 2022, to the fund and ProMedica, another affiliate of OCHA, also donated $10,000 in December 2018, according to the reports. Nationwide Children’s, a third affiliate with OCHA, donated $5,000 in December 2018 and another $5,000 in January 2023 to the transition fund.

The governor’s office referred the Daily Caller News Foundation back to DeWine’s comments on the bill and his veto. DeWine said last week that he was visiting hospitals that provide transgender procedures to hear families out on both sides of the issue but did not elaborate on which hospitals he went to.

Nick Lashutka, president of the OHCA, testified against House Bill 68, arguing that the bill “strips away” the rights of parents and their transgender children, according to The Guardian.

ProMedica, a member of The Ohio Children's Hospital Association and the largest hospital chain in Ohio also gave DeWine $10,000.

ProMedica seems to offer gender affirming care. pic.twitter.com/eVWWdhJdES

— Parker Thayer (@ParkerThayer) December 29, 2023

“These youth existed before we established our gender clinics, and they will exist if our clinics are forced to close,” Lashutka said.

A spokesperson for OCHA reiterated to the DCNF that DeWine visited with “clinicians and patient families of Ohio’s children’s hospitals.” The spokesperson also included a statement from Lashutka on the governor’s veto.

“We are thankful for Governor DeWine’s thoughtful approach in thoroughly researching the issue of gender-affirming care and vetoing Sub HB 68 today,” Lashutka said. “We welcome the opportunity to work with the Governor, the Ohio General Assembly and relevant state agencies to ensure Ohio’s youth have access to the critical care they need while also addressing concerns raised during debate on HB 68.”

Cincinnati Children’s has a Transgender Health Center that works with patients from five to 24 years old, according to the hospital’s website. The center’s frequently asked questions section explains that patients can get puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones with family consent and does not list an age limit.

Dr. Patty Manning-Courtney, the hospital’s chief of staff, also testified against House Bill 68, claiming that the impact of the bill would be “felt deeply and dangerously.”

Nationwide Children’s THRIVE Gender Development Program lists “management of gender-affirming medications, inclusive sexual and reproductive health care, menstrual management and other affirming interventions” as well as “fertility preservation options, puberty blockers or gender-affirming medicines” as services they provide, according to its website. The hospital does not note the age a patient must be to receive care from the program.

In 2021, ProMedica created an LGBTQ+ Patient and Family Advisory Council to educate healthcare providers on how to be more inclusive of the LGBTQ community, according to the Buckeye Flame, a local media outlet. The hospital said that the council was part of a larger goal to better include transgender patients and help refer them to medical facilities that can provide them with any care that ProMedica cannot.

A ProMedica spokesperson told the DCNF that the donations took place under “different leadership in place at the time.”

Cincinnati Children’s and Nationwide Children’s did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

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Article originally titled, “GOP Gov Who Vetoed Trans Bills Received Over $40,000 From Children’s Hospitals Supporting Sex Change Procedures.”

Ohio’s legislature passed a bill banning sex-change procedures for minors on Dec. 13, but Republican Gov. Mike DeWine has yet to make a decision on the legislation just three days before the deadline.

House Bill 68 bars doctors from performing sex-change medical procedures, including puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgeries, on minors and bans biologically male athletes from competing in women’s sports. The legislation was passed by the Senate in a 24-8 vote and by the state House of Representatives by a 61-27 vote before being sent to DeWine, who has yet to sign the bill three days out from the Dec. 29 deadline.

A spokesperson for DeWine’s office told the Daily Caller News Foundation that “the governor continues to review the bill.” If DeWine declines to either veto or sign the bill, the law will go into effect automatically.

DeWine said in an interview on Dec. 21 that he had been visiting hospitals to talk to families who support and oppose the legislation, according to The Associated Press.

Stella O’Malley, psychotherapist and director of Genspect, an international group that advocates for a “healthy approach to sex and gender,” told the DCNF that “many politicians feel paralyzed in the face of such hostility.”

“Many politicians choose to duck this issue as they feel they will be damned if they do and damned if they don’t,” O’Malley said. “It takes a pioneering and brave politician to grapple with this. But when we look at the astonishing rise in the number of people who regret their medical transition and make the difficult decision to detransition, it is clear that courage is required. We hope the Governor takes the time to read about these issues and comes to the right decision.”

Republican state Rep. Gary Click, who introduced the legislation, told the DCNF, however, that he “would not characterize the governor as hesitating,” explaining that DeWine was “performing due diligence.”

“Personally, I spent much more time before consenting to carry this bill,” Click said. “I respect that he is listening to all sides, especially when I know the facts are in our favor. The facts are on our side. The polls are on our side. The legislature passed HB 68 with an overwhelming majority. I am confident that when the governor considers the information before him he will do the right thing, which is to sign the bill.”

Hundreds testified in support and in opposition to the legislation, with some parents of transgender children and medical professionals arguing the bill would be harmful to transgender youth in the state, according to Fox 19, a local media outlet. A number of detransitioners spoke in support of the bill and one asked lawmakers to “close the door to harmful gender-affirming care.”

Both O’Malley and Click agreed that minors are not capable of consenting to transgender medical procedures and pointed to potential life-long side effects and health problems that have been reported as a result.

“These procedures impede the individual’s ability to orgasm and their ability to have children,” O’Malley told the DCNF. “Medical transition carries a heavy burden on the body and the risks of osteoporosis, heart failure and cognitive impairment are significantly increased by these procedures. Young people often feel indestructible. Sadly, as we age, we better understand risks.”

Nearly two dozen states have passed laws restricting sex-change procedures for minors, according to the Human Rights Campaign. A judge in Idaho ruled Tuesday against a state law signed in April, arguing that the plaintiffs would likely succeed on the merits of the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause.

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(Daily Caller)—School choice is going to be a hot-button issue next year as several states are set to propose legislation expanding education options, while others are gearing up to defend against lawsuits claiming voucher programs are unconstitutional and an “existential threat” to public schools.

School choice advocates passed legislation in Nebraska, Florida, Ohio and other states in 2023, with a major victory in Oklahoma as well after the Statewide Virtual Charter School Board approved an application for a Catholic online school in June, the first religious charter school in the country. Several states are looking to follow their lead in 2024 and expand education options for parents, while others have become the target of lawsuits by public education advocates, who argue that voucher programs are unconstitutional.

In Tennessee, Republican state Rep. Mark White, who is a former teacher, is hoping to put legislation on the agenda in January that would expand the state’s current voucher program from just three counties to all 95, according to The Tennesseean. White co-sponsored legislation for the original program back in 2019 but said that “it’s time” to bring school choice to the rest of the state.

“It just baffles me that we are pro-choice on so many things, but we still struggle with freedom of choice when it comes to schools,” White told The Tennesseean.

The original program received significant pushback from both Republicans and Democrats, eventually going to the state’s Supreme Court to settle the issue in 2022 after a lawsuit was filed, according to The Tennesseean. Over 3,400 students have applied to the program this year, but Democratic state Sen. Jeff Yarbro said that there is not enough data to show the program has been successful enough to justify expanding it.

A “good education is not a luxury or a one-size-fits-all solution” and parents need more choices now than ever after many children suffered from significant learning loss during the COVID-19 pandemic, White argued in an op-ed for The Commercial Appeal in Memphis.

Lawmakers are also going head to head on the issue in Texas, where Republicans recently failed to pass school choice legislation despite Gov. Greg Abbott calling four special sessions, according to the Austin American-Statesman. The House voted 84-63 Friday to take a proposal for an education savings account program out of a $7.6 billion education funding bill, with 21 Republicans joining the Democrats on the issue.

Abbott, however, promised to continue “advancing school choice in the Texas Legislature and at the ballot box,” in a statement to the Austin American-Statesman. He also said that he is “in it to win it” and “will maintain the fight for parent empowerment until all parents can choose the best education path for their child.”

In July, Ohio passed a budget for 2024 and 2025 that extended the state’s current voucher program to families making up to 450% of the poverty line or $135,000 for a family of four, according to the Dayton Daily News. The state is expected to spend an estimated $2 billion on the voucher program and families who are accepted will receive 12% more funding than they had in years prior, with high school students able to get up to $8,407, and kindergarten through eighth-grade students getting up to $6,165.

Despite this, a lawsuit filed in January 2022 by the Ohio Coalition of Equity & Adequacy of School Funding (OCEASF) is set to go to trial next year regarding the state’s voucher program, and nearly a third of public school districts have joined the lawsuit as of this year, according to the Cleveland Scene. OCEASF argues that the program “poses an existential threat” and has been taking away vital funding from public schools, according to court documents.

Republicans claimed, however, that the program allows parents to choose what is best for their child and dismissed arguments that it takes funding from public schools, noting that the program created a separate funding apparatus for those who choose private education, according to NBC4 Columbus, a local news station.

“That money doesn’t get taken from the public schools now, so that’s the great thing about it,” state Rep. Jay Edwards said.

Oklahoma, Wisconsin and South Carolina are facing lawsuits as well after state officials adopted school choice policies. The Wisconsin Supreme Court is set to hand down a ruling any day now on whether or not the state’s 32-year-old program that gives parents vouchers for their children to attend private schools is unconstitutional since it funds private entities, according to The Associated Press.

On Oct. 26, a group of parents, teachers and advocates filed a lawsuit in South Carolina, arguing that the state’s new school voucher program, which was passed in April, violates the “no aid” clause in the constitution barring the state from funding religious and private schools, according to The State.

“Our constitution reflects a binding commitment that the resources of our state be used to fully fund our public schools, which serve all students,” said Sherry East, president of the South Carolina Education Association. “Instead of private school vouchers, we should invest in our public schools by reducing class size, addressing the teacher shortage crisis and increasing parental involvement.”

In July, public school advocates in Oklahoma made a similar argument in their lawsuit, claiming that the state could not approve a charter for the St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School because the school will discriminate based on sexual orientation and gender identity that is not in line with Catholic doctrine. They also claim that the charter violates the state’s constitution because it will be funding religious indoctrination.

Republican Gov. Kevin Stitt previously told the Daily Caller News Foundation that he hopes to “unlock more private” options for education in the future.

OCEASF, White and Abbott’s office did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.

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School choice has become a hot-button issue for parents across the country, and several states like Oklahoma and North Carolina recently approved different measures that created more options when deciding where to send kids to school. The poll, published by the Yes. Every Kid. Foundation (YEKF), which is an organization dedicated to supporting “educational freedom” for families, asked respondents on both ends of the political spectrum whether or not they would support giving students the ability to go to whatever school best supported their needs, and 88% of Democrats responded yes alongside 83% of Republicans.

The poll noted that many children in the U.S. are assigned a school based on their zip code and asked voters if they would get behind initiatives to make “it possible for students to access any public school in their state regardless of where they live.” Over 60% of both Democrats and Republicans responded affirmatively, but when asked if they would support allowing children to attend whatever public school in the state helped them get the best education, both parties increased their approval rating by nearly 20%.

Independents also gave their overwhelming support when asked about school choice at 85%, according to the poll.

A new poll from YESF and @YouGov is the first in the nation to ask how increased flexibility and freedom for families would affect education. Overall, nearly two-thirds of parents believe additional options will strengthen it.

Read more: https://t.co/EQORECTd6r

— yes. every kid. foundation (@yes_everykid_f) October 18, 2023

When asked if school choice would improve America’s education system as a whole, K-12 parents came in at the top spot at 61%, with Democrats at 55% and Republicans at 52%, according to the poll. Republican voters interviewed for the survey made up one of the largest demographics in support of creating Education Savings Accounts, which use state funding to pay for the school of the parent’s choice at 71%, with Independents at 65% and Democrats ranking the lowest at 58%.

Additionally, more than eight out of 10 voters said that they would support measures making K-12 education more flexible for families in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the poll. K-12 parents and black voters ranked the highest in this category at 86%, with Democrats, Republicans and Independents agreeing at over 80%

“Americans believe more education options will improve our nation’s education system,” Matt Frendewey, vice president of the foundation, said in a press release. “A child’s access to a great education should not be determined by their family’s income or where they live. By expanding opportunities for families to customize the education to meet their kids’ needs, we can improve education more broadly. We will continue to listen to Americans while empowering families by removing barriers to learning.”

The poll was conducted from Sept. 20 to 25 and a total of 1,209 people were interviewed before the sample was brought down to 1,000 participants, with a margin of error of +/- 3.4%, according to the press release.

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The district paid Panorama Education, an education software company founded by U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland’s son-in-law, Xan Tanner, a total of $64,573 for the surveys, an annual membership fee and a professional development workshop for the 2023-2024 school year, according to documents obtained by PDE and shared with the Daily Caller News Foundation. The survey goes over a number of topics about school climate, including a section titled “Feelings About School,” which has students answer how often their teacher pushes them to think about race and ethnicity, ranging from “almost never” to “almost always.”

“How often do teachers encourage you to learn about people from different races, ethnicities, or cultures,” the survey reads. “How often do you think about what someone of a different race, ethnicity, or culture experiences?”

Students were also asked to weigh in on how their class discusses “major news events related to race” and how often the school encourages them to “think more deeply about race-related topics,” according to survey. Other questions ask students to rate how the school facilitates conversations about race and whether or not it does a good job helping “students speak out against racism.”

Erika Sanzi, director of outreach for PDE, told the DCNF that it was “strange” that a school district would spend thousands of dollars to “badger” students about race.

“There is something strange about spending so much taxpayer money on an outside vendor so you can badger kids about their thoughts and feelings on race, especially when there isn’t a shred of evidence that this relentless focus on race and ethnicity improves any outcomes for students,” Sanzi said.

A Panorama Education spokesperson told the DCNF that the district makes all the decisions about how to administer survey content to its students and what to do with the data after the fact.

“Panorama Education … helps students achieve academic success and well-being, and gives schools and school districts a platform to hear what parents, students and teachers need in the classroom,” the spokesperson said. “Districts own all the data and make decisions on how student data will be used. Our survey technology and research-backed templates are designed to help students succeed—which has become increasingly critical as we embark on academic recovery following the pandemic.”

A Massachusetts school district also paid $30,000 from 2018 to 2023 for social-emotional learning (SEL) surveys from Panorama Education for staff and students. The Old Rochester Regional School District’s “anti-racism subcommittee” conducted a Panorama Education survey of its 6-12 grade students during the 2021-2022 school year to gauge their “cultural awareness and action, diversity and inclusion, and sense of belonging.”

Panorama Education has been the subject of scrutiny due to its connection to Garland, who issued a memo in 2021 ordering the agency to “use its authority” on parents who were protesting at school board meetings all over the country. Some Republicans said that they felt Garland may have a conflict of interest during a 2021 House Judiciary hearing but the former director dismissed the idea, saying that there was “no conflict.”

CSSD did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

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Pro-choice advocates are working in multiple states to get abortion amendments on the ballot after the fall of Roe v. Wade in 2022.

Pro-choice activists in several states are attempting to put abortion amendments on the ballot that could enshrine the practice into law.

Lawmakers in multiple states have passed laws banning abortion at various stages since the overturn of  Roe v. Wade. Pro-choice activists, however, are attempting to make headway to protect access in Ohio, Arizona, Nebraska, South Dakota and Florida by making abortion constitutionally protected.

Ohio’s proposed abortion amendment, which was introduced in February, would make the practice legal up to birth if a physician deems it necessary to protect the mother’s life, according to its text. GOP legislators introduced Issue 1 in May, which would have required proposed amendments to obtain a 60% threshold instead of just a simple majority, but it failedto pass during the Aug. 8 special election.

After the results in Ohio, Stephen Billy, vice president of state affairs for Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, told the Daily Caller News Foundation that the pro-life movement is learning from past mistakes and is preparing to push back against these initiatives.

“We have learned many lessons from our defeat in these fights, but the main takeaway is that we must define the issues at stake early and often with a simple message,” Billy said. “So far, in all of the state battles, our side has failed to take this approach, allowing the left and pro-abortion industry and allies to define the effort.”

Arizona activists filed paperwork on the same day as Ohio’s special election for an amendment that would allow an abortion to be performed up until birth if a doctor deems it necessary to protect the physical or mental health of the mother.

The state banned abortion after 15 weeks, unless there is a medical emergency, following the Supreme Court’s decision in 2022 to overturn Roe v. Wade, according to the legislation. The law also made it a felony for a doctor to perform an abortion in the state.

Nebraska appeared to follow Arizona’s lead after the political campaign committee “Protect Our Rights” submitted paperwork for an amendment to protect access to abortion, despite state legislators passing a 12-week ban in May, according to the Nebraska Examiner. The committee is still working on drafting specific language for the amendment, but it would require 10% of the registered voters in the state along with 5% of the registered voters being from 38 of Nebraska’s 93 counties to get the measure put on the ballot.

Advocates in Florida have also been collecting signatures for an amendment, with organizers claiming in August that they had nearly half a million signees, according to NPR.

“As long as I have breath in my body, I’m going to continue to fight for freedom and liberation,” Trish Brown, who works with the grassroots organization Power Up People, told NPR. “I’m going to always continue to fight for being able to have control over my own body.”

Activists in South Dakota presented a proposal that would bar the state from creating restrictions on abortion before 13 weeks, and then would only allow some regulations, such as limiting abortions except in cases where the “physical health of the pregnant woman” is in danger, beyond 14 weeks, according to South Dakota News Watch. The measure is not supported by Planned Parenthood, which believes the measure is not far enough, according to The New York Times.

The amendments won’t make it onto this year’s ballots in the four states, but it could be a deciding issue for voters in 2024, according to the NYT. Several other states are still in the early stages of pushing abortion ballot initiatives; North Dakota, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Montana have made little official progress to get initiatives on the ballot.

“The ballot measures put forward in states across the country are a coordinated effort on behalf of the abortion lobby to impose their extreme agenda on pro-life states,” Billy told the DCNF. “We need political leaders and the movement to forcefully engage with these initiatives and we need to not only counter the deceitful messaging of liberal special interests but also the bias of the corporate media.”

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The Supreme Court could hear cases next term that have important ramifications for Americans of faith, according to legal experts who spoke with the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The Supreme Court will potentially weigh several faith-based cases involving free speech, sidewalk counseling outside of abortion clinics and workplace accommodations after handing down several religious freedom victories this past year, according to legal experts who spoke with the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The court handed down two highly-anticipated decisions in June, 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis and Groff v. DeJoy — the former dealing with the right of business owners to not be compelled to use certain types of speech and the latter regarding an employee’s right to a religious accommodation. These cases have set the stage for several other cases to be brought before the Supreme Court next year, legal experts told the DCNF.

“So far the court has only filled up around a third of its docket, maybe 20 out of 60 cases, or 20 out of 70 cases, and hasn’t really started filling in religious liberty cases yet,” Luke Goodrich, vice president and senior counsel at Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, told the DCNF. “So we’re more in a position of like, what are the big cases heading up to the Supreme Court in the near future?”

One such case that could be heard involves Christian baker Jack Phillips, who won a Supreme Court case in 2018 for refusing to make a cake for a gay couple. Despite his initial win, Phillips was sued again in 2021 for refusing to decorate a cake for a gender transition party and is currently awaiting a decision from the Colorado Supreme Court, according to John Bursch, senior counsel and vice president of appellate advocacy at Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF).

“What it will come down to in the Colorado Supreme Court is whether they think that cake artistry qualifies as speech,” Bursch said. “The US Supreme Court in 303 Creative cited an amicus brief … favorably, when it was talking about visual artists and that brief talks about cake artists. So if the Colorado Supreme Court just looks carefully at what the Supreme Court ruled in 303 Creative, that should control the outcome in Jack’s case, but if for any reason they disagree, then we’ll have to go back to the Supreme Court and ask for relief again.”

Another religious battle in the works is Hittle v. The City of Stockton, which is currently being fought in the Ninth Circuit Court regarding Fire Chief Ron Hittle, who was fired for attending a Christian leadership conference. Hittle’s case is about to get a lot of attention because of the Groff decision, according to Kelly Shackelford, president and CEO of First Liberty Institute (FLI).

The Groff case involved a postal worker who was forced to leave his job after being unable to obtain a religious accommodation to not work on Sunday. The Supreme Court ruled in the case that an employer could only deny such a request if they could prove it would cause “substantially increased costs in relation to the conduct of [an employer’s] particular business,” which changed nearly 50 years of legal precedent that had required an employee’s request be “reasonable” to prevent an “undue hardship” for the company, according to Shackelford.

“[Groff] changed the protection for religious liberty in the workplace and actually restores religious freedom in the workplace,” Shackelford told the DCNF. “But [the Supreme Court] didn’t go into detail on exactly how that would look and by laying out the new standard, they threw out the old standard. So you’re gonna have all these future cases that are going to come up that are going to play out with this new standard.”

The Supreme Court could also take up a case involving Catholic pro-life activist Debra Vitagliano, who, under a Westchester County, New York, law that creates a bubble zone 100 feet around abortion clinics, would not be able to pray outside of or minister to women considering an abortion.

Becket sued on behalf of Vitagliano in 2022, arguing that the law violated her rights to express her faith and her concerns about abortion under the First Amendment. The Supreme Court upheld a similar law in Hill v. Colorado in 2000, in which the justices said that the First Amendment right to free speech was not infringed by limiting protestors or sidewalk evangelists from coming within eight feet of a woman or clinic worker.

The decision has been criticized by many judges over the years and Vitagliano’s case will go straight to the Supreme Court, if accepted, to challenge its earlier decision, according to Goodrich.

“[W]e challenged that under the free speech clause and the court said, there’s a lot of criticism of Hill, but only the Supreme Court can overrule its own decisions,” Goodrich said. “So we’re about to take on the Supreme Court and say, ‘Here’s the vehicle you’ve been waiting for to set your free speech jurisprudence straight.’”

All three attorneys expressed that while they could never predict how the court will rule in any given case, the justices’ record over the past decade has indicated a strong stance on protecting the rights of religious Americans.

“It’s really interesting, if you look at the last decade, or a little more, since 2011, the Supreme Court has heard 25 cases involving religious freedom issues and 24 out of 25 have been in favor of the religious freedom side,” Goodrich said.

“When religion flourishes, culture flourishes too,” Bursch told the DCNF. “The court has been [protecting] that because the language of this the US Constitution, is so plain and so broad in protecting those rights, and that going all the way back to our founding, the protection of religious liberty and free speech has been so strongly a tradition in our country, that the court is reluctant to curtail that in any way, even though government officials seem to be doing that with increasing frequency.”

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In a secret society typically left untouched by the outside world, the Freemasons are struggling to come to terms with the transgender ideology in their all-male fraternity, according to members who spoke with the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The Freemasons, an all-male secret society whose history goes back to the Middle Ages, have been struggling to deal with the transgender movement infiltrating their ranks over the past several years, according to members who spoke with the Daily Caller News Foundation.

In 2018, the United Grand Lodge of England, founded in 1717 and considered by Masons to be the most senior of all lodges, announced that it would allow transgender individuals to retain their membership at the lodge or be eligible for membership if they were transitioning to a man, according to the BBC. In the U.S., the issue is far from settled, with conservative Masons in states like Texas clashing with the more liberal fraternities on the coasts, and according to several Masons who spoke with the DCNF on the condition of anonymity, the issue is splitting the society with real consequences for those not falling in lockstep.

“[N]ow that all of these English lodges have been forced to allow females in and the mother Grand Lodge of the world is now being required by its own country’s Supreme Court to force all of its own members to break their oath and let females in,” a prominent central Texas Mason told the DCNF, “America and every other Grand Lodge is now stuck in a gray area, and we don’t know what’s going to happen.”

In March, the Grand Lodge of Texas, which oversees all the Freemason chapters in the Lone Star State, issued an opinion on the transgender debate directly contradicting the U.K. decision from five years prior. The Texas Grand Lodge said that it was not possible for a transgender individual to be a Mason based on the way the membership rules were originally intended to be interpreted in 1722, five years after freemasonry became a nationally organized fraternity in England and specific rules were established.

“A biological woman (meaning an individual who was assigned female at birth) cannot be a Mason,” the opinion reads. “A transgender man (meaning an individual who was assigned female at birth whose gender identity or gender expression is now male) cannot be a Mason. A transgender woman (meaning an individual who was assigned male at birth whose gender identity or gender expression is now female) cannot be made a Mason nor remain a Mason.”

A longtime Scottish Rite Mason from Houston told the DCNF that despite the decision, however, other lodges in Texas continue to have multiple openly transgender members.

“The problem is lots and lots of lodges in Texas have been admitting transgender people, very visibly,” the Mason told the DCNF. “[One lodge] has several visibly transgender people, these are people who either already took the oath as a guy and then changed or took the oaths saying that they were nonbinary, gender fluid, or something … and this is considered a big provocation.”

Additionally, consequences for not following the directives of England’s Grand Lodge can be extreme, according to the Masons. Chapters deemed illegitimate are barred from Masonic charities, special dorms on college campuses, trips and events and can even be removed as a recognized lodge.

In light of this, one of the Masons told the DCNF that it would not surprise him if the opinion is rescinded in a year or two once leadership switches hands to prevent being excommunicated by the rest of the community. Texas Freemasonry is also experiencing a notable demographic shift as older, more conservative members are slowly growing less common while younger, more liberal men take their place, according to the Masons who spoke with the DCNF.

“The idea of gay Masons and transgender Masons is causing consternation and divisive issues and a lot of that comes from the diversity within the fraternity as far as religious and political beliefs,” the Houston-area Mason told the DCNF.

The tension behind the transgender issue is a long time in the making, according to the Masons who spoke with the DCNF. In May 2022, an older gay Mason in Austin, who is a well-known musician and referred to as the Pianist, was written up on charges for derogatory comments against the Grand Lodge of Texas, which is expressly forbidden, after it prevented him from playing music during a ceremony, according to documents obtained by the DCNF.

The Pianist accused the Grand Lodge of being homophobic, racist and misogynistic hypocrites, enforcing some rules and not others, according to the documents, and the outburst prompted several individuals to file charges, restricting him from nearly all of his rights as a member. To date, the Lodge has allegedly not ordered a trial, and according to the Masons who spoke with the DCNF, it is being delayed to avoid restarting a decades-long disagreement among some members about whether the secret society should accept gay and transgender members.

The accusers who filed charges declined the DCNF’s request for comment, and the Pianist’s identity was not disclosed.

Combining this with the lack of enforcement of the Grand Lodge’s decision, many conservative Masons are feeling disenfranchised and ignored, while some of the more left-leaning members argue that the decision is evidence of Texas Masons’ intolerance of those who fall outside of a Christian, conservative lifestyle or worldview.

“We have a group of Christian extremists who hijacked our fraternity and they want to try to turn it into something churchy … and we’re really pushing back hard on it,” a central Texas Freemason told the DCNF. “So that’s kind of where we’re at right now. And yes, the [Pianist] is part of a greater problem that we’re experiencing in Freemasonry. He just represented everything they hated and there was a perfect opportunity for certain elements within our fraternity to come after him and come after [his] lodge in general.”

“So I’m a conservative Christian,” another prominent central Texas Mason told the DCNF. “I’m a member of my church, my Boy Scouts and my civic organizations and so forth. So my personal opinion is the same thing that it says in the Bible, which is that homosexuality is a sin and that transgender is still defined by the Merck Manual, which is a physician’s manual, as being a mental illness. So I mean, that’s kind of what I see as reality, [and] that is very divisive.”

The one thing the Masons who spoke to the DCNF all agreed on was that the gay and transgender issues should be handled separately. They noted that Freemason law expressly forbids anyone other than men from being part of the fraternity but says nothing about the sexual orientation of any male members, pointing to several famous gay Masons such as Oscar Wilde.

“Transgenderism is trying to insert itself into the gay community and they are separate issues,” a central Texas Freemason told the DCNF. “And they are trying to hijack the gay movement by making them support transgenderism, saying that if you don’t support transgenderism, you’re not supporting the gays. That’s totally not true.”

The Grand Lodge of Texas did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.

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CampOut Florida is a nonprofit located in Florida’s Ocala National Forest that holds summer camps for “all genders, sexualities, allies, or children of queer families” and in addition to doing typical camp activities, encourages campers to “[love] their authentic self,” according to the organization’s website. TST’s Florida chapter is hosting a collection drive for the camp to help people donate supplies as part of the “Satanic Good Works campaign.”

“As part of a Satanic Good Works campaign, @TSTFlorida is collecting essential camp supplies for CampOut Florida, a non-profit summer camp for LGBTQ+ youth and allies! Help TST Florida with their goods drive by visiting their Amazon Wishlist,” the post on Twitter read.

Those who wish to donate can purchase rainbow duct tape, walkie-talkies, craft supplies and a variety of other items, according to the Amazon list. TST’s Good Works campaign, which is sponsoring the drive, says on its website that they work with a “wide range of projects in response to community needs.”

The camp, which opened in 2022, hosts kids from ages 10 to 17 and was voted “Favorite Local LGBTQ+ Youth Event” in 2022, according to the website. Students who attend are placed in either “gender-specific or genderless cabins” and in the Q&A section of the website, the organization emphasizes that they base the living arrangements on how “campers identify, not their sex at birth.”

TST and CampOut did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact [email protected].

Senate Bill 245 passed the Sunshine State legislature earlier this month with significant majorities in both the House and the Senate. DeSantis announced during a press conference Wednesday that he had signed into law a number of pieces of legislation, including a ban on transgender surgeries, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in education and limits on sex, gender identity and sexual orientation lessons for kindergarten through eighth-grade students.

“[The bill] will outlaw the mutilation of minors, it will outlaw the surgical procedure and experimental puberty blockers for minors,” DeSantis said. ”

The new law requires adults who wish to have sex-reassignment surgeries to be informed of the “irreversible nature and about the danger of the procedures” by a doctor and then sign a consent form, according to the bill. The bill also gives Florida courts the right to to “intervene and halt procedures for out of state procedures” when it involves minors.

“You have some states in this country that want to be a haven for these types of procedures, and even welcome minors without their parent’s consent into some of their jurisdictions,” DeSantis said during the press conference. “We’re obviously doing the opposite here and I think this provision is important. This is going to create a way to recover damages for injury or death resulting from mutilating surgeries or these experimental puberty blockers given to a minor.”

DeSantis went on to explain that some minors later regret their transition surgeries and that they should be able to sue doctors and medical providers for “hurt[ing] them.”

DeSantis’ office did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact [email protected].

Image by Gage Skidmore via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.