Youngkin defends new transgender policy

According to an article in the New York Post, Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin insisted Sunday that there is nothing “controversial” about the state’s new school policy requiring students to use bathrooms or play for sports teams that correspond to their biological sex and not their gender identity.

“This is not controversial,” Youngkin, a Republican, said on  CNN’s “State of the Union.”

He added that it is an issue parents should be deciding for their kids, at least when it comes to the bathrooms, instead of a blanket policy decided by the schools.

“I just think the idea that we’re going to have policies that exclude parents from their children’s lives is something that I have been going to work on since Day One,” the governor said. “We campaigned on it. We empowered parents to make decisions with regards to [COVID] masking in Virginia. We have empowered parents to make decisions with regards to curriculum that fits their families’ decisions.”

Youngkin, who made parental choice in schools a hallmark of his gubernatorial campaign in ​2021, has rolled back how his Democratic predecessor Ralph Northam dealt with transgender students.