A Caseworker Quits Over Texas’ Trans Kids Policy
What Next | Daily News and Analysis
Slate Podcasts
4.3 • 2.4K Ratings
🗓️ 19 April 2022
⏱️ 18 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Morgan Davis saw his job as an investigator in the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services as a calling. As a transgender man, he joined the child welfare agency to be the advocate he never had while growing up. But Davis eventually quit, following Governor Greg Abbott’s order to investigate the families of transgender children. While Abbott’s order is currently paused due to an injunction, many families are still left in limbo due to open cases – and other child welfare workers are handing in their notices.
Guest: Morgan Davis, investigator at the Travis County office of the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Morgan Davis is an investigator for Texas's Department of Family and Protective Services. |
| 0:12.6 | He says part of his job is to make sure that the children living in the homes he investigates feel like someone is watching out for them. |
| 0:20.4 | Just to have a friendly face walking in the |
| 0:22.9 | home and saying, I see you, you are loved, you are respected, and you have done nothing wrong |
| 0:27.9 | for any child. Morgan is a transgender man. He says he wanted to work for a child welfare agency |
| 0:35.1 | so that he could be the kind of advocate he never had when he was growing up. |
| 0:39.6 | If you look different or you feel different, and, you know, for myself, I've always looked like a little boy. |
| 0:49.4 | Although I was born in the gender of female. I always look like a little boy. |
| 0:53.7 | And so oftentimes there will be bullying. |
| 0:56.9 | You oftentimes feel isolated or scared. |
| 1:00.4 | And to have an adult be able to look you in the face and say, I see you, you're going to be okay. |
| 1:05.6 | I got you. |
| 1:07.0 | It would have been the world. |
| 1:16.2 | In February, Texas Governor Greg Abbott issued a new directive, ordering Morgan's agency to investigate the homes of children whose doctors have prescribed medical treatments that |
| 1:20.6 | trans advocates describe as gender-affirming care. |
| 1:24.9 | Governor Abbott described these treatments, including ones that can be reversed, as |
| 1:29.1 | sex change procedures, and he categorized them as a form of child abuse. This new directive |
| 1:35.6 | followed a proposed Texas bill limiting which bathrooms trans children could use, and another |
| 1:41.4 | proposed bill limiting which sports teams trans children could join. |
| 1:45.4 | So for Morgan Davis, this was yet another declaration from his state government |
| 1:49.5 | that seemed designed to make life difficult for those kids. |
| 1:53.8 | Morgan hoped this latest move was maybe just political bluster |
... |
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