Ron DeSantis won’t say how he’d handle his own kid coming out as LGBTQ+

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) has staked his entire presidential campaign on “parents’ rights” and attacking LGBTQ+ kids. But when Time magazine asked him how he’d respond if one of his own children turns out to be queer or trans, he refused to answer.

In an interview published on Wednesday, DeSantis talks endlessly about his “strong record on the issues important to parents.” His record includes bans on all LGBTQ+ instruction and trans-affirming policies in schools as well as on gender-affirming healthcare for trans youth.

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DeSantis likes to say that “Florida is where woke goes to die.” His home state is also becoming a graveyard for his presidential ambitions.

“I also just see it through the lens of a dad of a six, five, and three-year-old,” DeSantis told the interviewer. “Kids should be kids — there shouldn’t be an agenda [in schools].”

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When asked about the rights of parents to access gender-affirming care for their trans child’s best interest, DeSantis falsely mentioned “performing sex-change surgery on minors” — even though such surgeries aren’t conducted on minors — and mentioned “sterilizing children at age 13 or 14” even though puberty blockers are reversible and don’t cause infertility, according to one of the world’s oldest medical journals The Lancet.

DeSantis then compared gender-affirming care to taking his six-year-old daughter to get a tattoo. But unlike tattoos, gender-affirming care for trans kids is considered safe and essential by most major American medical associations.

DeSantis also claimed that physicians are “making a lot of money off” of trans kids. However, trans people only make up an estimated 0.4% of the entire U.S. population, making it a very small market. That is, the medical industry profits much more by far from targeting other, larger patient groups.

The Time magazine interviewer wrote, “When I ask how he’ll respond if one of his children turns out to be gay or trans, his eyes flash momentarily, and he swiftly shuts down the question. ‘Well, my children are my children… We’ll leave that—we’ll leave that between my wife and I.’”

DeSantis clearly wanted the interviewer to butt out of his child-rearing decisions, despite being willing to involve the government in everyone else’s.

The magazine article also noted that DeSantis is “an introverted candidate often derided as wooden,” and that his recent interview at the Iowa state fair by Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) was drowned out by “liberal activists blowing whistles and banging cowbells,” trolls chanting “We love Trump,” and circled overhead by a small plane with a banner that said, “Be Likable, Ron!”