California Paying for Illegal Migrants to Gender Transition Sparks Fury

Conservatives have reacted with fury after it was reported that illegal migrants in California can be eligible for gender-affirming care from Medi-Cal, the state's version of Medicare.

Beginning January 1, all undocumented immigrants in California who meet certain criteria, such as having been resident in the state since 2014 and having income below a certain threshold, automatically qualified for Medi-Cal.

The U.S. has recorded a substantial surge in illegal crossings at the southern border over the past few months, with law enforcement reporting more than 9,600 migrant encounters a day during the first three weeks of December, with 192,000 apprehensions reported for November. Control over the U.S.-Mexico border looks to be a major issue during the upcoming presidential election, with the Democratic mayors of New York, Chicago and Denver admitting they are struggling to deal with the influx.

Posting on X, formerly Twitter, Colorado House Republican Lauren Boebert hit out at the policy commenting: "California is now paying for illegal aliens to get sex changes. There's no punchline to this tweet. California is the punchline."

While state guidelines say that illegal migrants can qualify for gender-affirming care, it is unclear if any have taken up this option.

Responding to Boebert, conservative commentator Paul Szypula, who has more than 101,000 X followers, said: "California is horrible but so is the US border. Republicans in Congress had a year as majority to address it but refused to be tough when needed."

Another X user responded by attacking Boebert, posting: "Almost made it the whole day without some blathering bigotry. So close."

Medi-Cal had been available to those age 25 and under, or 50 and over, who met the income and residency thresholds for some time, but starting Monday it was extended to all unregistered migrants, with an estimated 700,000 more people becoming eligible.

A 2022 California state memo, viewed by online news outlet The Daily Caller, makes it clear that "gender affirming care is a covered Medi-Cal benefit when medically necessary." This matches advice from the Transgender Law Center, a transgender advocacy group, which in a recent publication on gender reassignment surgery said: "Despite what many Medi-Cal recipients have heard, Medi-Cal will cover some procedures."

On January 2, The Daily Caller published excerpts of the memo on receiving gender-affirming health care: "Gender affirming care is a covered Medi-Cal benefit when medically necessary. Requests for gender affirming care should be from specialists experienced in providing culturally competent care to transgender and gender diverse individuals and should use nationally recognized guidelines.

"Medical necessity is assessed and services shall be recommended by treating licensed mental health professionals and physicians and surgeons experienced in treating patients with incongruence between their gender identity and gender assigned at birth."

According to the Transgender Law Center, Medi-Cal "should cover hormone treatment, gender reassignment surgery, and other necessary procedures."

The organization explains: "Medi-Cal is required by law to evaluate requests on a case-by-case basis. They must approve those requests that they find to be medically necessary so long as the procedure is not considered to be 'experimental.' Medi-Cal's definition of experimental does not include gender reassignment surgery."

Newsweek has reached out to the office of California Governor Gavin Newsom by email for comment.

USA Boxing recently released a policy update allowing transgender women to compete as their chosen gender, sparking mixed response on social media.