H.R. 3688: Protecting Children from Experimentation Act of 2025

H.R. 3688 would add a new crime to federal law: knowingly performing — or helping perform — a gender-transition procedure on anyone under 18. A provider convicted under it could be fined, imprisoned for up to five years, or both.

The bill defines “gender-transition procedure” broadly. It lists 33 categories of hormonal and surgical care, including puberty-blocking drugs, cross-sex hormones at high doses, mastectomy, hysterectomy, orchiectomy, phalloplasty, vaginoplasty, sterilization, voice surgery, and the removal of otherwise healthy body parts.

Its federal reach is wide. The ban kicks in whenever there's almost any connection to interstate commerce — if the provider or patient crossed state lines, if a phone, computer, or the mail was used, if payment moved through interstate channels, or if any instrument used in the procedure had traveled across state lines. In practice, that covers most modern medical care.

The bill carves out narrow exceptions. They cover care for medically verifiable disorders of sex development, treatment of complications caused by a prior transition procedure, physician-certified emergencies, puberty blockers used for precocious puberty, and male circumcision.

The patient is treated differently from the provider. Someone who received a procedure as a minor couldn't be arrested or prosecuted, but could file a civil lawsuit against the provider who performed it. The bill also writes its own definitions of “sex,” “male,” and “female” into federal criminal law, defining sex as male or female “as biologically determined.”