Skrmetti and More Transgender Cases

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

The 6-3 affirmance by the U.S. Supreme Court in U.S. v. Skrmetti on June 18 was a decisive defeat for the transgender movement. The Court fully upheld a good Tennessee law banning transgender operations and treatments in children, and this conservative decision went further than it had to by declaring the law constitutional.

The pro-transgender side brought this appeal, apparently hoping for a Supreme Court ruling that would invalidate the Tennessee law and similar laws in at least 24 other states. Instead, the Court opens the door to additional states banning these surgeries and drug treatments.

Strident dissents by liberal justices on the Supreme Court are becoming a familiar pattern as 6-3 conservative decisions become the norm. On Monday, the same 3 liberal justices dissented with extreme dismay at a brief order by the Court majority that allows Trump to deport criminal migrants to other countries when their own country of origin won’t take them back.

The last election resolved the transgender and immigration issues as Trump campaigned on them at every rally. The Democrat Party ran and lost as the party that is pro-transgender and pro-illegal immigration, and no one should be genuinely surprised that the majority on the Supreme Court is rejecting the Democrats’ positions now.

Some liberals have been hopeful of bringing Justice Amy Coney Barrett to their side, after she ruled against Trump a couple of times. But her concurring opinion in Skrmetti last week was a complete rejection of the notion that there is any constitutional right that protects being transgender or transitioning to the opposite sex.

As a result of the Civil War and the 14th Amendment, racial discrimination gets special scrutiny from the courts. Justice Barrett flatly rejected giving that sort of scrutiny to laws touching on transgender issues, and Justices Thomas and Alito agreed with her.

On Friday, the Eleventh Circuit, while considering the issue of court-ordered taxpayer funding of transgender treatments for a county employee in Lange v. Houston County, immediately requested supplemental briefing on the impact of the Skrmetti decision on this case from Georgia. An initial panel of that court had ordered the county, and thus the taxpayers, to fund these medical procedures, but that ruling is being reconsidered by the full court on which Republicans have a 7-5 majority.

Skrmetti is not even the only transgender case being decided by the Supreme Court this month. The case of Mahmoud v. Taylor has proven to be as contentious for the High Court to decide.

In Mahmoud, a group of Muslim and Christian parents object to the indoctrination of their children in public school about transgender and sexuality issues without the parents’ consent, and without the parents even receiving advance notice. This is where the transgender issue is resolved long-term: whether schools can brainwash kids about it, rewarding pro-transgender answers with an “A” while penalizing students who disagree.

There should be an even larger majority of Justices on the side of parents who object on religious grounds to LGBTQ+ indoctrination in this upcoming Mahmoud decision as there was on the side of Tennessee in Skrmetti. During an exhausting oral argument that lasted nearly two-and-a-half hours in April, none of the Justices could point to any harm in letting parents opt out of this indoctrination.

But parents need advance notice before they can opt out, and public schools are not doing that. One of the objectionable books being taught was about a puppy who got lost during a Pride Parade, which is a clever way to make students comfortable with these parades that promote transgender lifestyles.

Ordinarily very few parents exercise the existing rights that they have today in many states to pull their children out of objectionable instruction relating to sex or health. The opt-out process can be cumbersome and parents who object the most have already taken their kids out of public schools.

Requiring public schools to give the community notice of these objectionable materials would be helpful, as then taxpayers could see what their high property taxes are being spent on. Lower reading and math scores in schools should be of concern to taxpayers, and so should high amounts of objectionable indoctrination.

Biden-appointed Ninth Circuit Judge Jennifer Sung wrote a decision for that left-leaning court in favor of Oregon schoolteachers who had been fired for objecting to the transgender ideology being imposed in schools there. The district court had dismissed the lawsuit by these schoolteachers, but the Ninth Circuit held in their favor and reinstated the case, captioned Damiano and Medart v. Grants Pass School District No. 7.

The school board later reinstated the teachers to different positions that were inferior to the ones they had before they spoke out. The courageous teachers had used their own electronic devices, on their own time, to promote the “I Resolve” campaign with resolutions for ending restroom access by the opposite anatomical sex and stopping the practice of schools using a gender-different name for a child without parental consent.

John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organizations with writing and policy work.

These columns are also posted on PhyllisSchlafly.com, pseagles.com, and Townhall.com.

Illegal Alien Crisis Compels ICE Raids

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

A meatpacking plant in Omaha, Nebraska, was employing nearly 80 illegal aliens, as uncovered by a much-publicized raid on June 10 by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Americans have since flooded the company with applications for these jobs, according to Breitbart.

Included among these illegal aliens is a man who had a final order of removal issued against him in 2019, yet he remained in our country. Another had been previously deported four times, and a third had three DUI arrests plus an illegal reentry conviction.

Omitted from most stories is that an illegal alien from Honduras carrying a weapon assaulted officers and agents while they were doing their job to enforce the law and protect Americans. Additional crimes by these illegal aliens include fraud and misuse of visas and permits, resisting arrest, illegal reentry, and misuse of Social Security numbers.

Raids have become necessary because state and local authorities, particularly in California but also in other states, are refusing to allow ICE access to arrested criminals for deportation purposes. Earlier this year the California legislature rejected a bill introduced by a Republican to overturn the California sanctuary law, signed by liberal Gov. Jerry Brown (D-CA), which prevents such cooperation.

ICE released a statement about its June 10th raid in Omaha that it “executed a federal search warrant at Glenn Valley Foods based on an ongoing criminal investigation into the large-scale employment of aliens without authorization to work in the United States.” Their only punishment will be deportation back to their home countries, and three of them have already agreed to return to Mexico voluntarily.

Omaha is located in a conservative Midwestern state but is represented by the anti-Trump Republican Rep. Don Bacon. Omaha’s public school board invites illegal aliens by announcing that it will not inquire or share the illegal status of students who are enrolled in its schools.

The Omaha Public School Board issued this statement in response to the raid: “Omaha Public Schools serves students and families regardless of immigration status. We do not ask about or share a student or family’s immigration status.”

Most illegal aliens do not speak English at home, and thus their children are not learning the official language of the United States or assimilating into our culture. Our public schools should not be allocating scarce educational resources towards non-English-speakers, while American children are not acquiring basic reading and math skills.

President Trump confirmed his deportation program on Sunday night on Truth Social. He observed that “the Brave Men and Women of ICE are subjected to violence, harassment, and even threats from Radical Democrat Politicians,” but Trump vowed that “nothing will stop us from executing our mission, and fulfilling our Mandate to the American People.”

Trump resolved a pitched battle among his advisers as to whether these raids would continue at farms, food processing facilities, and the hospitality industry of hotels and restaurants. Trump’s Agriculture Secretary had briefly persuaded Trump to exempt these employers of illegal aliens, but Stephen Miller and a backlash by MAGA led to the reversal of these exemptions.

Jobs in the hospitality industry will soon become more attractive with the promised elimination of the taxation of tips, about which Trump campaigned and Senate Democrats have already approved. These benefits should flow to hardworking American workers rather than to illegal aliens.

The meatpacking industry, which was the focus of the raid in Omaha, pays more than the minimum wage in most places. But employers can pay illegal aliens less than Americans, which is why some businessmen look the other way as illegal aliens fill jobs in their companies.

Trump vows to “expand efforts to detain and deport Illegal Aliens in America’s largest Cities, such as Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York, where Millions upon Millions of Illegal Aliens reside. These, and other such Cities, are the core of the Democrat Power Center, where they use Illegal Aliens to expand their Voter Base, cheat in Elections, and grow the Welfare State, robbing good paying Jobs and Benefits from Hardworking American Citizens.”

Trump linked this to the transgender travesty by criticizing those who “believe in Open Borders, Transgender for Everybody, and Men playing in Women’s Sports — And that is why I want ICE, Border Patrol, and our Great and Patriotic Law Enforcement Officers, to FOCUS on our crime ridden and deadly Inner Cities, and those places where Sanctuary Cities play such a big role.”

In words that describe Omaha and similar towns, Trump said he has “directed my entire Administration to put every resource possible behind this effort, and reverse the tide of Mass Destruction Migration that has turned once Idyllic Towns into scenes of Third World Dystopia.” Rather than calling this deportation, Trump correctly calls this a “REMIGRATION of Aliens to the places from where they came.”

John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organizations with writing and policy work.

These columns are also posted on PhyllisSchlafly.com, pseagles.com, and Townhall.com.

RFK Jr. Cleans House as MAGA Hoped

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (RFK Jr.), Trump’s Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), cleared the deck on Monday of Big Pharma’s control over vaccine policy. RFK Jr. fired everyone on the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), which has never recommended against any vaccine, including those later withdrawn as unsafe.

“A clean sweep is needed to re-establish public confidence in vaccine science,” RFK Jr. wrote in the Wall St. Journal, which itself has been a mouthpiece for the pharmaceutical industry. OpenSecrets.org identifies Big Pharma as the most influential group in Washington, D.C., and more than two-thirds of the U.S. Senate receives Big Pharma donations.

Many Americans have no idea what ACIP is, or understand that ACIP’s vaccine recommendations automatically become vaccine requirements for children to attend public schools. Private schools also require the same laundry list of ACIP-recommended vaccines, and Illinois this year considered legislation to require homeschool children to receive all these vaccines too.

Big Pharma’s lobbyists have cleverly obtained legal requirements in every state that automatically impose on children whatever ACIP approves. So although it appears that ACIP is merely making recommendations, in fact its recommendations become requirements for children unable to refuse the injections.

It used to be that nearly every state had a religious exemption to vaccination, and large states like California even had a philosophical exemption that did not require any religion. But Big Pharma has diligently worked to remove exemptions, such that California has neither a religious nor a philosophical exemption, while several other blue states including New York have eliminated their religious exemption.

Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) is an important part or partner of the MAGA movement that helped elect Trump along with a strong 53-47 GOP majority in the Senate. Among many stunning achievements by Trump’s Cabinet and special advisers, RFK Jr.’s overhaul of ACIP is one of the biggest and boldest reforms.

Personal observations of children after vaccination have led many to suspect that they are being harmed by injections they do not need. An alarming increase in autism, allergies, heart problems, and cancer cries out for an explanation, and one difference between younger and older Americans is that younger generations have had far more vaccines.

Covid was relatively safe in children and yet the Covid vaccine was pushed on them by ACIP, and has been required by many colleges as a condition of enrollment. In some cases children were injected with the Covid vaccine without their parents’ approval.

Hospitals give most infants the Hepatitis B vaccine soon after birth, although its purpose is to protect against a sexually transmitted disease. New Jersey, where the pharmaceutical industry has many offices, requires 3 doses of this and many other vaccines in children as a condition of merely entering kindergarten.

The liberal media understood immediately the significance of RFK Jr.’s housecleaning move, and some websites featured headlines about this with greater priority than news about the Los Angeles riots. When Tucker Carlson and James O’Keefe previously took on Big Pharma, they were soon forced out of their jobs.

The blowback against RFK Jr. will be intense, and it appears that Big Pharma already controls Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) who was initially planning to vote against RFK Jr.’s confirmation. Only a grassroots outpouring by MAHA in support of RFK Jr. caused Tillis to eventually vote in favor of him.

CNN quoted one of the fired members of ACIP as blustering that “I’ve never seen anything this damaging to public health happen in my lifetime.” The adviser asserted, “This will fundamentally destabilize vaccination in America.”

Instead, it might end vaccine tyranny in the United States, where children are forced to receive more vaccines than anywhere else in the world. American children typically receive 30 doses of vaccines by the age of one, due to how ACIP has relentlessly recommended virtually every vaccine.

Every member of ACIP whom RFK Jr. fired had been appointed by Biden, who famously abused his power by ordering all large employers to require Covid vaccination of their employees. The U.S. Supreme Court intervened on an emergency basis to block Biden’s vaccine mandate as unjustified by any law.

There has been a chorus of complaints about RFK Jr.’s mass firing from those who feed at the trough of Big Pharma. As an advisory committee, ACIP should be a diverse group that includes people who are skeptical about vaccine mandates.

RFK Jr. vows that the replacements he picks for ACIP “won’t directly work for the vaccine industry” and “will exercise independent judgment, refuse to serve as a rubber stamp, and foster a culture of critical inquiry — unafraid to ask hard questions.” This is just what a good doctor would want for MAHA vaccine policy.

John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organizations with writing and policy work.

These columns are also posted on PhyllisSchlafly.com, pseagles.com, and Townhall.com.

Trump Will Punish California for Trans Travesty

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

California just gave first-place awards to a transgender athlete in a girls’ state track championship. “A Biological Male competed in California Girls State Finals, WINNING BIG, despite the fact that they were warned by me not to do so,” Trump retorted on Tuesday on Truth Social.

“As Governor Gavin Newscum fully understands, large scale fines will be imposed!!!” Trump continued. Democrats are allowing this trans invasion of girls’ sports in multiple blue states, and it is typically not disclosed or reported unless someone speaks out.

Males are usually taller, faster, and stronger than females, and these differences are substantial in track and field events. The world record in the men’s long jump is nearly 5 feet longer than that of women’s, while the men’s high jump world record is more than a foot higher than women’s.

Hurdles for boys’ races are a half-foot higher than hurdles for girls in high school, which creates an additional incentive for boys to cross over to compete in the girls’ races. In 2023, a Massachusetts high school won the state title with points awarded to its transgender hurdler in a girls’ race.

Oregon allows any biological male to “access athletics and activities” by asserting that his gender identity is that of a girl. Only some of the competitors themselves know who the transgender athletes are, as this can be concealed from parents, spectators, and conservative media.

The second and third-place finishers in a recent Oregon high school girls’ track event protested awarding first place to a transgender, by declining to stand on the awards podium. “I just want everyone to know that this isn’t just about me or the other girl to step down. It’s about the girl in ninth place who should have had a place on that podium,” Alexa Anderson of Tigard High School told ABC’s local affiliate, KATU.

“It’s about the girl who didn’t qualify for state because they were beat by a biological male in districts,” she added. “It’s about the integrity and fairness of women’s sports.”

California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is term-limited out in 2026 while eyeing a longshot bid for the Democrat nomination for president in 2028, admits that this is unfair. “It is an issue of fairness. It’s deeply unfair,” Newsom told Trump-supporting Charlie Kirk, adding that “I totally agree with you.”

Yet Newsom has failed to protect girls’ sports in California, and let a transgender athlete win girls’ championships. The California school sports association did allow for the podium to be shared by the top girl competitors under a hasty rule change, but only after Trump objected.

While Democrats oppose protecting girls’ sports from the transgender invasion, they are funding a $20 million project to study why young men are shifting from Democrat to Republican. The shift in this demographic has steadily progressed since beginning in 2016, continuing through 2020, and then helping propel Trump to his victory by a wide margin in 2024, at the same time that the transgender invasion has increased.

Democrat politicians are doing what Planned Parenthood wants, as they have for more than half a century. Every House Democrat recently voted against removal of the $792.2 million in federal taxpayer money that has been flowing to Planned Parenthood, and Democrat senators will do everything they can to try to reinsert that funding back into the “big, beautiful bill” that has reached the Senate.

An analysis by the Heritage Foundation of Planned Parenthood in 2023 found that the abortion giant is “trying to corner the market in so-called transgender services,” and that its transgender approach likely “makes up the bulk of the dramatic rise” in its revenue and multi-billion-dollar assets.

More than a decade ago, Planned Parenthood first mentioned providing “hormone treatments for transgender patients,” disclosing 26 centers in 10 states for these treatments in its 2014-2015 annual report. By its 2021-2022 report, Planned Parenthood had “41 affiliates provide gender-affirming hormone therapy.”

Surgical abortions in clinics have been declining in the United States, for a variety of reasons. But Planned Parenthood has grown its revenue in the transgender world to more than make up for the shortfall.

An all-out attempt to change one’s gender can rack up bills easily exceeding $100,000 per person, which some attempt to shift to taxpayers to pay for. Last year the American Principles Project estimated that overall revenues for transgender drugs and surgeries exceeded $4.4 billion in 2023.

Harmeet Dhillon, the tough and savvy new head of the Civil Rights Division of Trump’s Department of Justice, has threatened to sue California for allowing transgender athletes to win top prizes in girls’ sports competitions. At its championship track and field meet over the weekend, two first-place awards and one second-place award were given to a transgender athlete.

John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organizations with writing and policy work.

These columns are also posted on PhyllisSchlafly.com, pseagles.com, and Townhall.com.