Council Member Cabán Explains Vote on General Orders

Caban.

Permission to explain my vote.

Permission, granted.

Thank you.

I will always support the transgender community.

I will not back down because the Trump administration wants to set them up as scapegoats.

I'm not gonna roll over as members of our community are villainized and demonized for who they are.

I'm going to defend our transgender and gender nonconforming neighbors at all costs.

And I'm not defending an ideology, I'm defending lives.

Standing up to Trump and continuing to provide life-saving health care is what would actually protect young people.

The idea that taking away health care is to protect children is false.

The best way to protect young people is to continue to give them access to the care that they need.

In fact, every major medical association in America supports access to gender affirming care at all ages.

Countless studies show that gender-affirming medical interventions were associated with lower odds of depression and suicidality.

So when the Trump administration and others say that they are trying to help children, they're lying.

They're trying to scapegoat a small population and take away their access to life-saving medical care.

The people sounding the alarm on this are mostly brave adult parents who fear for their children's health and safety because life-saving care is being taken away from them.

And to be on other myths, gender-affirming health care has a less than 1% regret rate.

And for context, knee replacements have an up to 20% regret rate.

Families and children's are and children are having life-saving care taken away, and that's horrible and traumatic.

And so I stand very proudly to say aye on that package, aye on all, uh, except for SLR one, on which I abstain.

Thank you.

Thank you.