Yesterday, the West Virginia House of Delegates approved an amendment from Del. J.B. Akers ® to allow a child’s “treating health care provider” to examine a child’s genitals without the consent of their parents.
The amendment was actually an improvement over a previous version of the bill, which, state Democrats argued, would have allowed teachers to perform the genital examinations.
Akers’ amendment was the Republican response to one proposed by Del. Kayla Young (D), which would have banned child and adult genital examinations altogether.
“It’s unconscionable that Republicans would support legislation that authorizes intrusive visual inspections of minors without parental approval,” Young said. “West Virginians should be alarmed and disgusted by this invasion of privacy.”
It also says that all intersex people are “either male or female” but does not give a basis for assigning a sex to them.
Here’s the text of the bill that was passed: https://www.wvlegislature.gov/Bill_Text_HTML/2025_SESSIONS/RS/bills/sb456 sub1 enr.pdf
Can someone please point out where this language is because I’m not finding it and it tracking the history of this bill, found here, it appears to me that it was removed.
https://www.wvlegislature.gov/legisdocs/chamber/2025/RS/floor_amends/sb456 hfa akers 3-6 _1.htm
It’s an amendment, linked in the article.
Yes, however Akers Amendment from 3/6 was superseded by two other ones from Martin on 3/11 and according to local media coverage the bill that was ultimately signed into law doesn’t have Akers stuff in it.
That’s why I posted the full text of the legislation that was actually signed into law. There’s no “amendment” or text that I can find in that legislation that matches the stuff from Akers. It looks to me like Martin successfully killed Aker’s amendments on the 11th of March.