While speaking to self-described “transgender female” Dr. Gwendolyn Paige Herzig, Arkansas state Sen. Matt McKee, a Republican, asked whether Herzig has a penis.
“Do you have a penis?” McKee asked point-blank.
“That’s horrible,” Herzig responded, ultimately declining to answer the question while describing it as “highly inappropriate.”
Arkansas lawmaker asks transgender woman if she has a penis at hearingwww.youtube.com
A transgender female is a biological male who identifies as a female.
“Any other question I was expecting other than what I got,” Herzig told NBC News. “It was probably the most publicly humiliating thing I’ve ever gone through.”
Alejandra Caraballo, a clinical instructor at Harvard Law School’s Cyberlaw Clinic who identifies as a transgender woman, described the question as “sickening.”
“Absolutely sickening. Arkansas State senator Matt McKee asked a trans person at a legislative hearing ‘do you have a penis?’ Does this State Senator have any basic human decency?” Caraballo tweeted.
The Democratic Party of Arkansas accused Republicans of exhibiting “transphobia.”
The exchange occurred during an Arkansas Senate Judiciary Committee meeting regarding a proposal that pertains to the liability of health care professionals who provide gender transition services to minors that results in “physical, psychological, emotional, or physiological injury.”
While the state already has a law to ban the provision of gender transition services for minors, a federal judge temporarily blocked in 2021, according to the Associated Press.
Radical leftist gender ideology remains an area of significant societal debate, especially as it pertains to children, who could face lifelong consequences if they pursue gender transition measures. The controversial topic is also frequently debated in terms of athletics and whether biological males who identify as female should be permitted to participate in women’s and girls’ sports.
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