| There have been a number of responses in the wake of the tragedy at Annunciation Church in Minneapolis. Governor Walz has announced his intention to call a special session to address gun violence, including calls for a ban on assault weapons, but otherwise the Governor has not released any details on what a full proposal might include. Last week, the Governor said, “I am not going to allow anyone to try and make the case that the United States is unique in either mental health issues or other things. The thing that makes America unique in terms of shootings is we just have more guns and the wrong types of guns that are on the streets.” We are grateful that the Governor and the media so far has been careful in equating mental illnesses with gun violence. You can read a thoughtful response here from The Violence Prevention Project Research Center at Hamline University. Their research has made it clear that it’s not about mental illness alone, but other factors have a role such as a crisis, access to guns, studying other mass shootings, and desire for notoriety. “But mass shootings are complex events, and prevention requires multiple lines of defense.”
Last week, Minnesota House Republicans released a school safety agenda which includes funding for school security grants and calls to expand safety funding to non-public schools. The House GOP proposal also calls for boosts in funding for “mental health treatment beds.” While we appreciate the inclination to increase funding for mental health, increasing access to treatment beds is complicated because it relates to rates and we doubt any hospital in MN is willing to add psych beds for children right now.
NAMI Minnesota has developed a list of recommendations if a special session is called including increasing funding for school-linked mental health, allowing funds to be used to support the whole family, expanding the grant funds to provide free supervision to clinical trainees to focus on school-linked providers, and increasing funding for respite care and crisis services. Increases in mental health resources have been named by both parties as a possible priority during a special session, and we are working to educate legislators on our ongoing efforts to build the children’s mental health system.
Unfortunately, in addition to calls for reform there has been misinformation shared about some laws and their impacts in Minnesota. Because the shooter at Annunciation Church identified as transgender, there have been particularly confusing comments made about the trans community and laws that have recently been passed in Minnesota.
Trans Refuge Law
In 2023, the Minnesota Legislature passed HF 146 which establishes Minnesota as a trans refuge state. This law was passed in response to other states clamping down on the availability of gender-affirming care. It is important to note that “gender-affirming care” is defined by the World Health Organization as “Gender-affirmative health care (that) can include any single or combination of a number of social, psychological, behavioral or medical (including hormonal treatment or surgery) interventions designed to support and affirm an individual’s gender identity.” In other words, gender-affirming care is not only used by trans and nonbinary people but by anyone who seeks medical care that is affirming of their gender, including cisgender people. For example, hormone therapy is commonly used in cancer treatment and to relieve symptoms of menopause regardless of a person’s gender.
Some states have passed laws that make it illegal for parents to allow gender-affirming care as it is defined differently in different states’ laws. In these states, parents could be threatened with having their children removed under child protection laws for allowing children to access gender-affirming care. Minnesota’s trans refuge law simply states that Minnesota will not enforce another state’s law requiring removal of children related to gender-affirming care. This makes Minnesota a “refuge” for those parents who are seeking gender-affirming care for their children. Such families could come to Minnesota if they are threatened with removal of their children in a different state. This only applies to cases related to gender-affirming care, not if a child is actually unsafe or neglected.
Some have made the erroneous claim that the trans refuge law forces parents to seek gender-affirming care or else children can be removed. That is not true. Medical decisions between children, parents, and medical providers are highly sensitive and personal decisions and there are no laws in Minnesota forcing parents to choose one kind of treatment over another.
Conversion Therapy
This leads into the other area of confusion, conversion therapy. In 2023, Minnesota also passed a law banning “conversion therapy” and NAMI Minnesota was a strong supporter of the law. While it is commonly named conversion “therapy,” the practice has been debunked by medical professionals and is not a form of therapy at all. Conversion therapy has been shown to be incredibly harmful to youth and their mental health, because it seeks to actively force a person to conform to – not explore – a certain gender or sexual orientation.
It is important to note what Minnesota’s law actually says. First, the law specifically prohibits mental health professionals and practitioners from practicing conversion therapy on children. The law is very intentionally limited to the mental health professional relationship with clients. Second, the law states what is not considered conversion therapy, “Conversion therapy does not include counseling, practice, or treatment that provides assistance to an individual undergoing gender transition, or counseling, practice, or treatment that provides acceptance, support, and understanding of an individual or facilitates an individual’s coping, social support, and identity exploration and development, including sexual-orientation-neutral interventions to prevent or address unlawful conduct or unsafe sexual practices, as long as the counseling, practice, or treatment does not seek to change an individual’s sexual orientation or gender identity.”
This is a complicated way of saying that people with gender dysphoria are able to seek counsel from natural supports like religious leaders and mentors without violating the law. The only practice that is prohibited is a mental health professional or practitioner actively trying to change a patient’s gender identity or sexual orientation.
This is important because some have also made the erroneous claim that allowing conversion therapy would have somehow prevented the shooting at the Annunciation Church. In truth, conversion therapy is incredibly harmful to people’s mental health. The claim that if the shooter had conversion therapy they would have somehow come to a different action is ridiculous and ignores the complexity of gun violence, while actively pushing harmful narratives about those in the LGBTQIA2S+ community.
On Aug. 26, NAMI National joined partners at The Trevor Project and AFSP in filing an amicus brief in Chiles v. Salazar before the Supreme Court in support of states’ right to ban conversion therapy, a discredited and harmful practice. The case challenges Colorado’s 2019 state law banning licensed mental health providers from engaging in conversion therapy with minors. NAMI and partners filed the brief to argue in support of keeping the ban on conversion therapy in place. The amicus brief provides evidence that shows LGBTQ+ youth subjected to conversion therapy experience higher rates of suicidality and that states have the authority to regulate health professions. The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on the case on Oct. 7 and is expected to issue a ruling by June 2026. If the court sides with the state of Colorado (Salazar), conversion therapy bans in Colorado and other states will remain in place. However, a ruling in favor of the plaintiff (Chiles) could jeopardize these policies. |
