KY House passes bill to protect conversion therapy, reverse Beshear’s executive order
A Republican-backed bill that initially sought to protect mental health professionals’ ability to provide conversion therapy was gutted on Wednesday and replaced with language to nullify the governor’s executive order banning the use of tax dollars to pay for the controversial practice.
Original language in House Bill 495 from Rep. David Hale, R-Wellington, was ostensibly aimed at protecting mental health professionals from discrimination for offering certain “protected counseling services.”
But on the House of Representatives floor Wednesday, Hale replaced the entirety of the bill with language to overturn Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear’s 2024 executive order banning the use of tax dollars to pay for the practice. Conversion therapy is a widely discredited form of counseling that attempts to change a person’s sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression.
Hale called Beshear’s order an “abuse” of power that “infringes on parental authority.”
Beshear’s order “shall be of no force or effect,” through Jan. 1, 2028, the floor amendment reads.
The new language also prevents enforcement of any future order or administrative regulation from Beshear that is “identical or substantially the same,” to his September 2024 order.
The bill would “ensure Kentuckians across the commonwealth have access to mental health care they choose, (and) it protects mental health care professionals . . . and ordained members of the clergy from discrimination when providing counseling services,” Hale said when introducing his bill Wednesday.
The House voted 77-18 to pass the measure with the amendment overturning Beshear’s order. It now heads to the Senate.
“I think this is a really sad moment,” House Minority Whip Lindsey Burke of Lexington said before she voted against the bill.
“I’m sad for children who need support and who are going to find conviction from the people who are meant to support them,” she said. “I’m sad for the lives that will be lost, for children who feel they are invalid as a result of what we’ve done today.”
Counseling services “protected” under the bill
Hale’s initial bill, before it was gutted Wednesday, was referred to as the Mental Health Counseling Protection Act and would have protected mental health care professionals, mental health care institutions and ordained ministries from discrimination for providing “protected counseling services,” and create a civil cause of action for anyone who believes they’ve been discriminated against under the bill, should it become law.
The original version defined counseling services that are “protected” as any counseling, talk therapy or other speech “performed with the goal or purpose to relieve discomfort or distress caused by an individual’s sex, romantic or sexual attraction, provided that the service involves no obscene materials or aversive treatments that inflict physical discomfort or pain, or require any lewd or lascivious conduct.”
Conversion therapy, also known as reparative therapy, hinges on a belief being LGBTQ is a condition that must be cured or corrected. It’s opposed by all major medical associations, including the American Psychiatric Association, which reaffirmed its opposition to the practice in July 2024, saying “conversion therapies lack efficacy and may carry significant risks of harm.”
In September 2024, Beshear signed an executive order prohibiting the use of state and federal dollars to pay for conversion therapy. It did not amount to a total ban on private practice of conversion therapy, though it encourages certain professional boards to penalize or ban it.
Beshear said the practice “hurts our children, has no basis in medicine, (and) has no basis in science.”
Last week, Hale told the House State and Local Government Committee, “parents should have the right . . . to seek professional guidance, be it from a therapist, a counselor, a minister, a priest, a rabbi, without the threat of action being taken against them or the individual providing those services.”
Kentuckians “have a right to seek counseling services that align with their values, their principles, their morals, and provide a safe approach to the mental health of the minors that they have in their homes,” Hale said.
But opponents, including mental health professionals, argued the bill would allow therapists and religious leaders to legally offer discredited, harmful counseling practices under the guise of parental freedom.
“The clear scientific consensus from the American Psychological Association, along with every other major medical and mental health group, is that this widely-discredited practice of so-called conversion therapy has no place in the mental health care of LGBTQ youth,” Eric Russ, executive director of the Kentucky Psychological Association and a licensed psychologist, told lawmakers in committee last week.
“Granting a license for mental health care is about protecting the public from exactly this sort of harm,” he added. “We have an ethical obligation to provide them care that is supportive, evidence-based and affirming to their sexual orientation (or) identity.”
Since the bill seeks to protect therapy that’s offered with the purpose of relieving discomfort or distress related to a person’s sexual attraction, for instance, Rep. Matt Lehman, D-Newport asked Hale: what “if a child is not in discomfort or distress, and they’re forced to undergo some sort of therapy, would that still be protected?”
Hale told Lehman it comes down to “parental choice.”
“As long as those minors are in the homes of their parents, the parents, in my opinion, have the right and the privilege of seeking what ever help they feel is necessary for that child,” Hale said.
“Just so we’re clear, you’re OK with protecting types of therapies that have been discredited by professional organizations?” Lehman asked.
Hale didn’t answer the question directly, but said he felt the testimonies of the people who spoke in opposition to the bill were “not correct.”
On the House floor Wednesday before voting against the bill, Rep. Sarah Stalker, D-Louisville, said she wanted her colleagues to “understand how detrimental a bill like this really is.”
“The title alone — An Act Relating to Mental Health Counseling — when we are doing the exact opposite to support people fully for who they are,” she said. “This is harmful and it’s certainly not compassionate.”
Beshear agreed.
“Conversion therapy has no basis in medicine or science, and it can cause significant harm to our kids, including increased rates of suicide and depression,” he said after the vote. “This is about protecting our youth from an inhumane practice that hurts them.
“Kentucky cannot possibly reach its full potential unless it is free from discrimination by or against any citizen – unless all our people feel welcome in our spaces, free from unjust barriers and supported to be themselves.”
Correction: This story has been updated to reflect the bill was amended on the House floor to nullify an executive order relating to taxpayer spending on the service. An earlier version of this story said the bill as passed would have prohibited discrimination against conversion therapy.
This story was originally published March 5, 2025 at 3:22 PM.
