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The Trump administration is reviewing the curriculum for California’s sex education programs on healthcare accuracy and age appropriateness. This is a move that sparked backlash from LGBTQ+ supporters who are worried about queer and trans sexual health information being censored.
Last week, California was asked to submit all educational materials to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Children and Family Administration from a federally funded personal responsibility education program.
The Department of Health offers $75 million in annual funding to prepare programs across the country. The goal of these programs is to prevent adolescent pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.
“As part of our radical transparency efforts, we ensure that curriculum students are age-appropriate and medically accurate,” ACF’s representative vice-secretary Andrew Gradison said in a statement in the Curriculum Review.
Jorge Reyes Salinas, a spokesman for LGBTQ+ civil rights organization Equality California, has been called Glaudisson’s statement misleading.
“This isn’t about curriculum transparency, it’s censorship, it’s simple and simple,” Salinas told The Times. “This investigation into California’s prep program appears to be politically motivated and an attempt to undermine comprehensive, medically accurate sex education services that serve our most vulnerable youth.”
According to the California Department of Public Health, California’s preparatory program focuses on providing sexual education to young people aged 10 to 19, reaching people who identify as low-income, homeless, foster parents or LGBTQ+.
The department says the California prep curriculum has been shown to affect young people to delay sexual activity, increase condom or contraceptive use in sexually active people, and reduce the number of sexual partners.
Salinas said he views the administration’s investigation into the curriculum as a thinly veiled attempt to erase the transgender community, transgender healthcare, and mentions of different gender identities and pronouns.
“This is all part of a calculated political attack on trans and non-binary people,” he said.
In January, Trump issued an executive order that the government would only recognize two genders: a man and a woman, effectively erasing federal perceptions among transgender people. His administration weakened non-discriminatory protections under the Affordable Care Act, giving healthcare providers and insurance companies more room to deny services to transgender individuals.
Trump also challenged new California laws that prevent districts from notifying parents if their children ask them to use a different name or pronoun in their classroom.
Last week, attention was paid to the California prep program. The Daily Mail published an article stating that the curriculum discussed role-playing “presenting couples of the same gender and discussing the use of sexual assistance.”
The article said in a California post that “we will use taxpayer money to teach children about adult toys and roll playing.” The California Department of Public Health did not immediately respond to a request for comment regarding the accuracy of the claim.
Salinas calls the comments “silly” and says the key to the California prep program is to provide valuable lessons on abstinence, birth control, sexually transmitted diseases, healthy relationships and decision-making.
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