California is interesting state because the Democrats have majority control of the House and Senate. The governor is also a Democrat. So there are no brakes on what they can do. I like to read stories about them to find out what Democrats would do if they had no opposition.

Here is a story from The Federalist:

California Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a new law Thursday night to strip rights away from parents who protest their children’s blind pursuit of destructive surgeries sold to confused minors as “gender affirmation.”

Under Senate Bill 107 introduced by San Francisco-area State Sen. Scott Wiener, California will now become a “refuge” for trans-identifying minors who seek irreversible medical treatment for gender dysphoria. The legislation was supposedly aimed at blocking red states from enforcing laws barring extreme treatments for underage victims, and instead invited those minors to seek surgeries in California.

The bill eliminates parental authority over children everywhere in the country, by allowing California doctors to prescribe transgender drugs to children in other states.

Jay Richards, a policy expert at the Heritage Foundation, and Emilie Kao, a vice president and senior counsel at Alliance Defending Freedom, broke down the components of the law in Newsweek.

“California courts will have the power to strip custody from parents, wherever they live, who doubt the wisdom of these experimental and irreversible procedures — if their child so much as steps foot in California,” the pair explained. “It would also allow California doctors to treat minors still in other states. With the advent of telehealth, a child could get a prescription for hormones from a California doctor while at home in Arkansas or in Florida.”

[…]Under California’s new law, parents might not even know whether their children are pursuing these dangerous drugs and procedures. Senate Bill 107 mandates that doctors hide children’s medical information from parents if related to “gender identity,” even if requested by subpoena.

And what’s the effect of all this permissiveness?

Here is a study that explains what happens next.

Summary:

Lowering legal barriers to make it easier for minors to undergo cross-sex medical interventions without parental consent does not reduce suicide rates—in fact, it likely leads to higher rates of suicide among young people in states that adopt these changes. States should instead adopt parental bills of rights that affirm the fact that parents have primary responsibility for their children’s education and health, and that require school officials and health professionals to receive permission from parents before administering health services, including medication and “gender-affirming” counseling, to children under 18. States should also tighten the criteria for receiving cross-sex treatments, including raising the minimum eligibility age.

And this is the interesting part:

In the past several years, the suicide rate among those ages 12 to 23 has become significantly higher in states that have a provision that allows minors to receive routine health care without parental consent than in states without such a provision. Before 2010, these two groups of states did not differ in their youth suicide rates. Starting in 2010, when puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones became widely available, elevated suicide rates in states where minors can more easily access those medical interventions became observable.

Rather than being protective against suicide, this pattern indicates that easier access by minors to cross-sex medical interventions without parental consent is associated with higher risk of suicide. The Heritage model plotted the difference in a three-year rolling average of suicide rates between states with minor access provisions and states with no such provision. Chart 2 plots the trend in this difference for those ages 12 to 23 who could have been affected by the policy when cross-sex medical interventions became available. For comparison, Chart 2 also shows the trend in this difference for a group ages 28 to 39, who could not have been affected by these policies, since the people in this group would have been at least 18 when puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones became available.

Without making any adjustments, suicide rates among those ages 12 to 23 (blue line) begin to spike in states that have provisions that allow minors to access health care without parental consent relative to states that have no such provision around 2016, after cross-sex medical interventions became more common. By 2020, there are about 3.5 more suicides per 100,000 people ages 12 to 23 in states with easier access than in states without an access provision. There is no similar spike in suicide rates among those ages 28 to 39 (grey line) at that time.

I think if I asked Gavin Newsom what he hopes to achieve with his assault on parental rights, he’d say that he wants to reduce suicide rates among children. Sadly, the scientific evidence shows that his policy achieves the exact opposite effect. This is what always happens when Democrats are in charge. They legislate in order to feel good and look good. But the result is never good.