In crafting its foster care rule that was finalized in April, HHS officials took inspiration from social workers in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, who spent years pioneering a program that strong-arms parents into affirming whatever confused beliefs children express about their gender.

Parents who decline risk losing a voice in their child’s life.

This from dailycaller.com.

Alex Roque, who runs the Ali Forney Center for homeless LGBTQ youth in New York City, asserted on a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) webinar last fall:

Transphobia is child abuse.

In less than three minutes, he cast a vision for completely transforming child protective systems nationwide.

He argued:

Family rejection of a child’s gender identity cannot be dismissed as a personal view. Non-affirmation must be treated as abuse.

Further:

If they were denying them food or denying them access to school or denying other things, there would be headlines.

There would be prosecution.

Among gender activists the Obiden-Harris (Read: Obama) Regime has enlisted to shape its policies, Roque’s definition of abuse is not fringe, and his vision for reshaping the system is not hypothetical.

The Daily Caller News Foundation discovered in reviewing hundreds of documents and emails obtained via public record requests:

The program developed in Cuyahoga County using federal grant funds provided the HHS’[s] Administration for Children and Families (ACF) with an ideal model for infusing gender ideology into foster care and social services.

The Obiden-Harris Regime’s new federal rule directs states to ensure foster children who identify as LGBTQ are placed in affirming homes. These “designated placements” must commit to creating an environment that supports a child’s “status or identity,” including through access to age-appropriate “resources, services, and activities.” To gender activists consulted by The Obiden Regine, being “affirming” means assuming the child knows best about his or her identity—even if what he or she claims to want is life-altering medical procedures like hormone blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgeries to appear more like the opposite sex.

According to an information sheet for caregivers on the Cuyahoga County Division of Children & Family Services (DCFS) website:

To Cuyahoga County child protective services, being affirming often means providing kids access to items like chest binders or prosthetic packers that mimic a penis.

Frequent communications with federal officials indicate Cuyahoga County played a prominent role in shaping the rule, which was just one part of a broader effort to support LGBTQ youth the agency undertook at the direction of Joe Biden. But voices of county social workers weren’t the only ones the agency heard.

Emails obtained by the DCNF show:

ACF senior advisor for LGBTQI Initiatives Julie Kruse, who celebrated the Cuyahoga County team as “trailblazers,” reached out to dozens of other activists to weigh in on the agency’s efforts.

When the rule was announced in September 2023, it quickly faced resistance. A coalition of 19 Republican states slammed the proposed rule, arguing it would infringe on religious liberty and free speech protections. Religious groups warned it would restrict faith-based providers.

Those concerns were well-founded: In states like Washington and Vermont, Christian couples have lost their foster care licenses due to similar state regulations. But as the activists consulted in the development of the federal rule show, these objections only scratch the surface of problems with the rule.

Parents in a handful of states have already sounded the alarm, claiming local authorities deemed them unfit guardians for refusing to allow their children to undergo a gender transition. In light of federally funded programs, like the one operating in Cuyahoga County, stories like these sound more like harbingers of an organized effort to undermine the family than one-off incidents.

Vernadette Broyles, president and general counsel of the Child and Parental Rights Campaign, told the DCNF there has absolutely been:

[A]n uptick in families that are having their custody of their child taken away, investigated or disrupted [because they believe in] biological reality.

Rachel N. Morrison, director of the HHS Accountability Project at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, told the DCNF:

The underlying premise of the rule is that it is mistreatment and abuse if you do not affirm a child’s self-selected identity.

This premise is dangerous and could extend outside the foster care context to adoption, custody disputes, and schools.

Final thoughts: I doubt I will ever be convinced what is portrayed in the following clip is a proper course of treatment. Gender Dysphoria wrongfully being treated is something else certainly on the Trump To-Fix list.

God speed to Conservatism and the Take Back of our Constitutional Republic.