The proposal from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) would require child welfare agencies to place LGBTQ children in “environments free of hostility, mistreatment, or abuse” based on the child’s sexual orientation, gender identity or expression.
It would also require caregivers to undergo cultural competency training to ensure LGBTQ youths are placed in homes where their identities are affirmed.
But the rule has met some opposition in the GOP, The Hill’s Brooke Migdon reports.
A bill introduced last month by Rep. Jim Banks (R-Ind.), who is currently running for an open Senate seat, would prevent foster and adoptive families from being required to affirm a transgender child’s gender identity. The measure, called the Sensible Adoption For Every Home Act, has four Republican co-sponsors.
Other Republicans have argued that the proposed rule would discriminate against faith-based providers.
A bill filed in the House and Senate in November by Rep. Mike Kelly (R-Pa.) and Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), a former GOP presidential candidate, would prevent government agencies from penalizing child welfare service providers that are unwilling to “take action contrary to their sincerely held religious beliefs,” including affirming a child’s gender identity or sexual orientation.
Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.), one of the bill’s 17 Republican co-sponsors in the Senate, wrote in a December editorial that the measure would effectively overrule the Biden administration’s “new woke standard.”
Twenty-eight states and Washington, D.C., have explicit laws or policies in place to protect LGBTQ youths in foster care from discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, and another six have laws prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation only, according to the Movement Advancement Project, a nonprofit organization that tracks LGBTQ laws.
In 13 states, state-licensed child welfare agencies may legally refuse to place and provide services to children and families — including LGBTQ people and same-sex couples — if doing so conflicts with their religious beliefs.
About 5 percent of foster youth identify as transgender, and studies have shown that LGBTQ young people are overrepresented in the child welfare system.
