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Jan 27 • 8 tweets • 3 min read
“[T]he 2023 legislative season stands out for the aggressiveness with which lawmakers are pushing into new territory” with a slew of anti-transgender bills.

We’ve been investigating anti-transgender initiatives in Florida, Virginia, and Texas. #FoiaFriday
nytimes.com/2023/01/25/us/…
Last year, the Florida Board of Medicine voted to restrict gender-affirming care.

We asked the state Dept. of Health for analyses regarding the impacts of this decision, communications between board members and the governor’s office, and more.
We submitted public records requests to five county sheriff departments in Florida seeking communications with the activist group Moms for Liberty, which has advocated for policies that would ban discussion of gender identity in schools.
americanoversight.org/documents?docu…
We submitted records requests to the Virginia Department of Education for emails with far-right education groups and policy assessments related to the department’s “Model Policy” that compels school districts to adopt policies that limit the rights of transgender students.
We’ve also been investigating a Texas directive that instructed state officials to investigate cases of minors receiving gender-affirming medical care as child abuse.
We asked the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services for records reflecting the number of cases it’s investigating as a result of the directive.
americanoversight.org/document/recor…
Records we previously obtained show DFPS leaders told employees to avoid written communications about investigations of families and facilities providing gender-affirming care. americanoversight.org/texas-child-we…
Last year, we filed an amicus brief in @ACLU and @LambdaLegal’s lawsuit challenging Abbott’s directive. Records we obtained reveal that DFPS adopted new policies and procedures in response, and staff interpreted the changes as a new rule.
americanoversight.org/american-overs…

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More from @weareoversight

American Oversight Profile picture
Jan 26
The Arizona Legislature adopted new rules that call for the destruction of all emails 90 days after being sent or received — a rule change that only benefits lawmakers who want to hide the truth from the people they serve.
mohavedailynews.com/news/145057/le…
New rules adopted by the Senate entirely exempt from public release any texts about official business if sent on personal phones — a flagrant public records loophole.
If these rules had been in place in 2021 or 2022, the public would not have learned the whole truth about the partisan “audit” of Maricopa County.
americanoversight.org/investigation/…
Read 5 tweets
American Oversight Profile picture
Jan 25
NEW: A judge granted our petition to require the Office of Virginia Gov. Youngkin to release records related to the governor’s “inherently divisive concepts” tip line.
americanoversight.org/judge-grants-a…
From the start, this tip line was a divisive ploy designed to score political points at the expense of Virginia teachers and students. After publicly touting the program, Gov. Youngkin has fought tooth and nail to maintain its secrecy.
In a hearing today, the judge also rejected the office’s efforts to dismiss our case but stayed the order requiring the governor to produce records pending an appeal of the decision.
Read 7 tweets
American Oversight Profile picture
Jan 23
Leaders in Texas, Arizona, & other states have deployed law enforcement & military resources to attempt to counter unauthorized immigration at the border, efforts that are highly controversial & potentially unconstitutional. Here’s how we’re investigating.
americanoversight.org/investigation/… Leaders in Texas, Arizona, ...
In 2021, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott launched Operation Lone Star, an expensive border security operation allegedly to combat crimes like drug and human trafficking, that echoed nearly two decades of similar initiatives in the state.
By May 2021, Abbott had sent 500 members of the Texas National Guard and hundreds from the Texas Department of Public Safety to the border.

In June, Abbott asked other states to commit resources to the operation as well.
Read 11 tweets
American Oversight Profile picture
Jan 20
Lawmakers in Texas have proposed expanding the attorney general’s power to prosecute election crimes.

Records we obtained show the Texas AG’s office spent over 22,000 staff hours working on voter fraud cases in 2020 — yet it closed out only 16 minor cases. #FoiaFriday
Last month, the Texas secretary of state confirmed that there was no widespread voter fraud or other serious issues with the state’s 2020 election. texastribune.org/2022/12/19/tex…
The records we uncovered, reported on by the @Houstonchron, also showed that the Texas Attorney General’s office spent almost twice as much time working on voter fraud cases in 2020 as it did in 2018, yet resolved half as many cases.
houstonchronicle.com/politics/texas…
Read 6 tweets
American Oversight Profile picture
Jan 18
With Roe overturned, there are growing concerns about the potential use of digital surveillance to prosecute people who have abortions. @propublica reports that some websites selling abortion pills are sharing sensitive data with third parties like Google.
propublica.org/article/websit…
Last year, we filed a suite of public records requests to investigate if state attorneys general are in contact with companies that could conduct this digital surveillance.
We sent records requests to the AGs of Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, South Carolina, Texas, and Utah for communications with tech companies, app developers, and data brokers involved in capturing reproductive health data.
Read 5 tweets
American Oversight Profile picture
Jan 13
Yesterday, a South Dakota judge ruled that our lawsuit seeking Gov. Kristi Noem’s travel and expense records could proceed, rejecting efforts by Noem’s office to prevent public accountability.

Here’s how we’ve been investigating Noem’s use of taxpayer dollars. #FoiaFriday
In 2021, we uncovered records that showed Noem spent thousands on decor and furnishings for her office and residence. Her office spent about $60,000 between January 2019 and September 2021.
americanoversight.org/new-records-de…
In May 2022, we requested travel and expense records from Noem’s office. In June, the office rejected the request. We followed up later that month with a “formal” request, which was again denied, leading us to sue in September.
americanoversight.org/american-overs…
Read 6 tweets

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