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Dr Rachel Levine, President Biden’s candidate for Assistant Secretary of Health, is the first openly transgender federal official confirmed by the Senate, and her appointment has been applauded by transgender rights advocates.
But Dr Levine’s confirmation hearing briefly turned combative Thursday, when Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky opened his questioning of the candidate with a tirade about “genital mutilation” and a request to know if she supported the surgery. change of sex and hormone therapy for minors. (An earlier version of this post incorrectly indicated the day of the hearing.)
“Are you willing to let a minor take things that prevent puberty, and you think he gets that back?” Mr Paul, who is an ophthalmologist, said at one point. “You give a woman enough testosterone to grow a beard – do you think she’ll be a woman again when you stop testosterone?”
Dr Levine responded calmly that “transgender medicine is a very complex and nuanced field with solid research and standards of care” that she would be happy to discuss with him.
The clash revealed the profound change Washington is undergoing as President Biden takes office, overturning the policies of his predecessor, former President Donald J. Trump, who worked aggressively to undermine transgender rights. Mr Biden, on the other hand, is seeking to make his administration more welcoming to the LGBTQ community.
Mr. Biden has repealed Mr. Trump’s ban on transgender people from serving in the military. LGBTQ references are now commonplace, and visitors to the White House site are now asked if they would like to provide their pronouns when filling out a contact form: her / her, he / him or them / them.
And as the Senate hearing unfolded, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California and Majority Leader Senator Chuck Schumer of New York called a press conference to call on Congress to pass the Equality Act, which would amend the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to include protections for LGBTQ people.
Since Mr. Biden appointed her, Dr. Levine has been subjected to attacks on social media and from conservative media that claimed, without evidence, that she advocated sex reassignment surgery for minors, which is not generally practiced in the United States.
Dr Levine, a pediatrician who previously focused on eating disorders and adolescent mental health, was also the LGBTQ Community Liaison for the Diversity Office at Penn State College of Medicine.
Critics picked up on a speech she gave in 2017 describing hormone therapy as a standard of care for transgender youth, as well as a tweet she posted in January 2020 about a study showing that transgender youth with access to drugs that block puberty are at reduced risk of suicide.
“This study is important because it is the first to show this specific association”, Dr Levine wrote.
No other Republican responded to Mr. Paul’s line of questioning, and Democrats briefly ignored his comments until Senator Patty Murray, Democrat from Washington, who presided over the hearing, made the statement. ‘Praise Dr Levine for his “thoughtful and medically informed response.” Ms Murray added: “It is really essential for me that our candidates are treated with respect and our questions focus on their qualifications and the work ahead, rather than on ideological and damaging statements like those given to us by the Senator Paul.
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