On April 8, Alabama became the first state in the nation to make it a felony to provide gender-affirming care to trans youth when Gov. Kay Ivey signed Senate Bill 184 into law only one day after it was passed by the state’s legislature. Media Matters found that mainstream national TV networks almost entirely failed to cover the bill before it was signed into law and are now giving a sympathetic platform for its right-wing supporters to argue in favor of denying trans youth lifesaving best practice medical care while criminalizing health care providers. 

Introduced on February 3, SB184 threatens doctors with up to 10 years in prison for providing gender-affirming care to anyone under the age of 19. Another bill that was concurrently passed and signed into law, House Bill 322, forces trans students in public schools to use bathrooms and changing rooms in accordance with the sex listed on their original birth certificates while also banning classroom discussion of gender identity and sexual orientation from kindergarten through fifth grade. Both bills were passed by the legislature on April 7 and signed by Ivey on April 8. 

Described as perhaps “the most extreme anti-transgender bill any state has put forth yet,” SB184 has been widely criticized by human rights organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union and the Human Rights Campaign. The bill was also condemned by the Biden administration, with the Department of Justice calling it unconstitutional. The best practice gender-affirming care that it bans has the support of every major medical organization in America, including the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics. 

Barring any potential injunctions resulting from legal challenges, SB184 will take effect on May 8.

Mainstream networks failed to cover SB184 before it was signed into law and continued to undercover it afterwards

Despite the existential threat SB184 represents to trans youth, their families, and the doctors who follow best practice medical care for trans youth, mainstream TV news largely failed to cover the bill prior to it being signed into law. This is in line with the apparent lack of interest mainstream networks have exhibited this year in the face of an unprecedented assault on the rights of trans Americans. 

According to a study by Media Matters, the only mention of the bill prior to April 8 came from Chris Mosier, a trans athlete and advocate who mentioned the legislation during a conversation about trans athlete Lia Thomas on the March 17 edition of MSNBC’s Hallie Jackson Reports. 

After Ivey signed the bill into law, outside of MSNBC, major networks’ coverage of the state’s threat to imprison doctors and forcibly detransition trans youth remained minimal to nonexistent. From April 8 through April 17, mainstream cable and broadcast TV news networks aired 9 segments on SB184 amounting to 27 minutes of coverage. However, that coverage was not distributed evenly. 

Segments on MSNBC comprised 24 minutes of that total, with a segment on ABC News’ Good Morning America making up another approximately 2 and a half minutes. CNN, CBS News, and PBS each ran a single segment, amounting to 30 seconds or less spent discussing the bill. NBC News has yet to mention it as of 1 a.m. EDT on April 19. 

Coverage is lacking essential information while often elevating the perspective of one Republican proponent of the bill

Beyond the dearth of discussion on the SB184, mainstream network coverage often failed at providing necessary information on the health care targeted by the bill while also uncritically elevating the voices of the legislation’s proponents. 

Nearly half of all segments on the bill from mainstream networks included the perspective of one anti-trans politician – Alabama state Rep. Wes Allen. Allen, who sponsored the House version of the bill and has claimed that gender-affirming care for trans youth is “real abuse of children,” was interviewed for segments on MSNBC and ABC News. Other segments on MSNBC included anchor Chuck Todd and correspondent Yamiche Alcindor paraphrasing arguments made by Allen claiming the bill was “to protect children.”

During these segments, Allen’s extreme anti-trans views in favor of SB184 – supported by extreme anti-LGBTQ group Alliance Defending Freedom – were treated as equally valid to the perspectives of trans youth, whose care is supported by the medical community and civil rights organizations. 

This example of mainstream media’s “both sides” framing around SB184 is all the more egregious considering not a single segment from any network mentioned that broad support for gender-affirming care from mainstream medical organizations. This is essential information for news outlets to provide in any context when discussing attacks on gender-affirming care, but especially in coverage that provides a platform for a politician to make unscientific claims about the medically necessary care they are targeting.  

Inaccurate and unsubstantial coverage provides cover for lawmakers pushing restrictions on health care for trans youth

Much like their failure to cover the most extreme piece of anti-choice legislation passed in Texas last year until it was too late, mainstream TV networks’ silence on SB184 provided cover for its passage. As well, their both-sides approach may provide further security for those pushing copycat legislation, as with the lawmakers in Florida who have already announced their intent to introduce similar felony bans on gender-affirming care for trans youth next year.    

This is the most recent escalation in an ever-growing number of legislative attacks on the trans community and, in particular, trans youth. 2022 has already witnessed the greatest number of anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ bills introduced in state legislatures, breaking a record set just last year, when Arkansas became the first state to ban gender-affirming care (although its implementation has since been blocked by a federal court). Although SB184 is the first ban on gender-affirming care to be passed this year, at least 12 other states are considering similar bills. According to a recent study from the University of California, Los Angeles, more than a third of trans youth are at risk of losing health care as a result of this current influx of legislation.

Like Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s order earlier this year instructing state welfare officials to investigate the parents of trans youth for abuse, the Alabama law is already making refugees out of the families of trans youth. As long as mainstream networks remain indifferent to the growing rhetorical, physical, and legal threats faced by LGBTQ Americans, and right-wing outlets remain committed to its antagonistic smear campaign against them, Republican politicians will continue to press this line of attack against trans kids and their families without fear of media pushback. 

Methodology 

Media Matters searched transcripts in the SnapStream video database for all original episodes from any weekday or weekend edition of ABC’s Good Morning America, World News Tonight, and This Week; CBS’ Morning News, Mornings, Evening News, and Face the Nation; NBC’s Today, Nightly News, and Meet the Press; and PBS’ NewsHour and all original programming on cable networks CNN and MSNBC for any of the terms “trans," “transgender,” “gender,” “sex,” or “puberty” within close proximity of any of the terms “children,” “minor,” “kid,” “health,” “care,” “medical,” “treatment,” “blocker,” “delay,” “drug,” “hormone,” “orientation,” or “identity” and either of the terms “Alabama” or “Ivey” from February 2, 2022, the date the Alabama legislature introduced SB184, through 1 a.m. EDT April 19, 2022.

We also searched transcripts in the Nexis database for all original episodes of the aforementioned shows on networks ABC, CBS, NBC, and PBS for any of the terms “trans," “transgender,” “gender,” “sex,” or “puberty” within close proximity of any of the terms “children,” “minor,” “kid,” “health,” “care,” “medical,” “treatment,” “blocker,” “delay,” “drug,” “hormone,” “orientation,” or “identity” and either of the terms “Alabama” or “Ivey” or any variation of the term “Senate Bill 184” from February 2, 2022, through 1 a.m. EDT April 19, 2022.

We timed segments, which we defined as instances when SB184 was the stated topic of discussion or when we found significant discussion of said legislation. We defined significant discussion as instances when two or more speakers in a multitopic segment discussed the legislation with one another. We rounded all times to the nearest minute.

We then reviewed all identified segments in their entirety for whether they included comments from proponents of SB184 or whether any host or correspondent referenced the broad support gender-affirming care has from the medical community.