From the August 28, 2023, edition of Salem Media's The Jenna Ellis Show

JENNA ELLIS (HOST): You have done so much great work in the state of Missouri, attorney general, and now you have become the first state actually to bar the genital mutilation of children at the trial court defending this law. So, talk about this and what's actually going on, because I think that all 50 states should take your lead. 

ANDREW BAILEY (MISSOURI ATTORNEY GENERAL): Well, proud to have delivered a win in the fight to protect children here in the state of Missouri and nationally. Missouri's led on this issue in so many different ways, from receiving a whistleblower affidavit about a transgender clinic here in Saint Louis that prompted so much of the work that we've done at the state level to promulgate an emergency rule that put some safeguards in place, call for a moratorium, launch a multiagency investigation, first of its kind in the nation, and then ultimately to defend the law that the General Assembly passed and the governor signed into law. 

…

ELLIS: And it makes so much sense that when this is a victimization of children and their parents or doctors or whoever is involved are making these choices for them before they reach the age of adulthood. And we can obviously have the moral conversation about whether that should be permissible in the United States of America, regardless of your age. Because the truth is, a man can't be a woman. A woman can't be a man. But there is definitely a distinction in terms of liability creation and the victimization of someone who didn't choose this path for themselves and this was perpetuated upon children. And so what was the legal strategy going into this that ultimately gave you the victory that you would encourage other states to model? 

BAILEY: Yeah. Well, first of all, how dare anyone tell these children that God put them in the wrong body? We know he doesn't make mistakes. And really that's what we're up against. 

But the plaintiffs raised equal protection clause claims that this law would violate the equal protection clause, and they raised those claims under the Missouri state constitution to keep us in state court. And at the end of the day, what they failed to acknowledge was that the Missouri constitutional equal protection clause is coexistent with and analyzed in the same way as the federal equal protection clause in the United States Constitution. 

And if you think about it, 100 years of jurisprudence around the equal protection clause has codified around the position that you cannot discriminate against people based on immutable characteristics. And yet here the plaintiffs are claiming that gender's mutable. Their argument fails on its face. It makes zero sense. And so we were able to prevail. 

But if you look at the court order that was handed down on Friday afternoon, when we delivered that win for the people of the state of Missouri, paragraph 10 is really important. And what it says is that the court found unpersuasive the medical evidence adduced by the plaintiffs. In other words, he said the court specifically said that the medical evidence was contradictory, confusing, and raised more questions than answers. That means there is no medical consensus that this is gender-affirming care. Care’s got nothing to do with it. This is the sterilization of children masquerading as medicine. 

ELLIS: Yes, and really well said. And so just because you label something, or the left is labeling something, that is inconsistent with what it is on its face doesn't mean that we go with their label or their definition, exactly like trying to label a boy a girl or a girl a boy, when clearly their chromosomes and their external genitalia show differently. I mean, it's just — it’s patently absurd. 

But they — so they raised this equal protection argument. What even was their theory under that? Because I mean, it just on face as you're talking about this and what you've already articulated is totally ridiculous. But it's claiming somehow, I mean, that parents have the right to just go in and decide for their children what gender they want them and that this is somehow permissible to mutilate their bodies without the consent, which you can't as a minor. 

BAILEY: Yeah. The plaintiffs, ACLU and Lambda Legal, want the state court to find a constitutional right to sterilize children. I mean, it's absolutely absurd. And so that's exactly what we're fighting against. And again, it's using the right language to talk about this the right way and call it what it is. And that's why having a hearing in open court, putting on our evidence, making the plaintiffs put on their evidence — they have the burden of proof — and then cross-examining their witnesses and making them own those opinions in open court, in front of an audience, in front of a judge, where the lamestream media can't hide from it. Look what happened. 

The New York Post just last week came out and said, oh, you know what? Some of these whistleblower claims there in Saint Louis are actually proven to be true. So the national mood on this is shifting because we're shining the light of truth on it. And that's what going to court was all about. We cross-examine their quote-unquote “experts” and got them to own the fact, admit under cross-examination, under oath that the studies they were relying on were weak science at best, and that they were ignoring opinions out of from experts out of Europe, which it opined that these procedures were dangerous, unsupported by evidence, and had long-term negative, irreversible health consequences. So the state absolutely has a compelling interest in barring it. And just last week, on Monday, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals handed down an opinion overturning a trial court preliminary injunction finding that Alabama, in fact, demonstrated a likelihood of success on the merits that they had a compelling interest in protecting children.

So the national mood is changing on this. The legal landscape is changing on it. And yesterday, or, excuse me, last week's win at the trial court level draws up a winning play for other states to follow to keep moving this thing in the right direction.