Abuse Label For Parents? Video Resurfaces

Reporter holds microphone toward person in suit during interview — Photo: wellphoto / Shutterstock

A Texas Democrat running for the U.S. Senate once told state lawmakers that parents who refuse to go along with a child’s claimed gender identity are committing abuse, and newly resurfaced video is forcing him to answer for it.

Quick Take

A 2019 hearing clip shows Texas Rep. James Talarico calling rejection of a child’s gender identity “abusive behavior.”
Talarico voted in 2025 for an amendment stating that rejecting a child’s gender identity or sexual orientation is abuse.
He voted against Texas’s 2023 law banning gender-transition drugs and procedures for minors.
Talarico reversed himself on transgender athletes in girls’ sports after years of voting the other way.
His Senate campaign now says his record has been distorted, even as fact-checkers flag confusion over his own shifting answers.

A 2019 Hearing Statement Resurfaces

During a 2019 Texas legislative hearing, Talarico said flatly that a parent’s “unwillingness to acknowledge a child’s gender identity…is abusive behavior.” He added, “We consider that abusive to the child”. That statement is now the centerpiece of a new campaign video attacking Talarico as he runs for the United States Senate, with critics arguing it exposes years of extreme positioning dressed up as mainstream politics.

The statement did not happen in a vacuum. In 2025, Talarico voted for an amendment from fellow Texas lawmaker Jo Jones that spelled out the same idea in legislative text. Jones described her own amendment this way: “My amendment makes it clear: rejecting a child’s gender identity or sexual orientation is abuse”. Talarico’s vote for it ties his 2019 comment directly to a real legislative effort.

A Voting Record That Backs Up the Words

Talarico’s votes line up with his rhetoric. In May 2023, he was one of 56 Texas lawmakers who voted against Senate Bill 14, the law banning gender-transition drugs and procedures for minors and blocking public money from paying for them. The bill passed anyway and became law, but Talarico was on record trying to stop it. He also backed Democratic amendments that would have let some minors with “severe gender dysphoria” keep getting gender-affirming prescription drugs.

During his Senate primary campaign, Talarico went further than just state-level votes. He pledged in writing, at least twice, to support the federal Equality Act, a bill that would write gender identity and sexual orientation into federal nondiscrimination law. That pledge, combined with his Texas voting record, paints a clear picture of where he stood for years on these issues.

Flip-Flop on Girls’ Sports

Talarico also voted against Republican-backed restrictions on transgender athletes competing in girls’ sports while serving in the Texas House. That changed in September 2026, when he said publicly that he now opposes transgender athletes competing in girls’ sports “if it risks safety or fairness”. Local Texas outlets covering the race described the shift plainly as a reversal, not a clarification, of his earlier record.

The Campaign’s Damage Control

Talarico’s camp insists the attacks twist his record. He has said directly, “I oppose gender-reassignment surgeries for minors,” and argues his SB 14 vote was about the bill’s broad reach, not support for surgery on children. He claims he backed a narrower amendment limiting the ban to surgeries alone and has said he trusts “parents and doctors” over “politicians in Austin” to make decisions for kids.

PolitiFact did find that one Republican-aligned ad went too far, ruling it false to claim Talarico voted for taxpayer-funded surgery for kids, since surgery funding was never part of what he voted on. But that narrow correction does not erase the 2019 quote, the 2025 amendment vote, or the Equality Act pledges. It simply means critics need to be precise about which claim they’re making, not that the underlying record disappears.

Why Texas Families Should Pay Attention

Parents have the right to raise their own kids without the government branding them abusers for setting boundaries. Talarico’s own words from 2019, paired with a 2025 vote putting that same idea into legislative language, show a pattern stretching across years, not a single offhand comment. His recent attempts to sound moderate on sports and surgery do not undo a voting record built around weakening parental authority and expanding gender ideology in state law. Texas voters deserve a senator who trusts parents, not one who spent years suggesting parental judgment itself is the problem.