Dem Bill Will Allow School Psychologists to 'Kidnap' Kids as Young as 12 - Remove from Homes Without Parental Consent
A California legislative proposal that its sponsor says will increase mental health services for children is being attacked by its opponents as “state-sanctioned kidnapping.”
Democratic Assemblywoman Wendy Carrillo said her bill fixes an issue that denies poor kids on the state’s Medi-Cal insurance plan the same coverage as other children.
“[Assembly Bill] 665 is about making sure all young people, regardless if they have private health insurance or are Medi-Cal recipients, have access to mental health resources,” Carrillo said, according to the Sierra Sun Times.
But along the way, parents could become spectators to the treatment of their children.
AB 665 requires “the professional person treating or counseling the minor to consult with the minor before determining whether involvement of the minor’s parent or guardian would be inappropriate.”
The bill allows children as young as 12 to “consent to mental health treatment or counseling on an outpatient basis, or to residential shelter services” if they present a danger to themselves or others or are alleged victims of abuse.
“A professional person offering residential shelter services … shall make their best efforts to notify the parent or guardian of the provision of services,” the bill says.
The bill says parents should be involved “unless … the professional person who is treating or counseling the minor, after consulting with the minor, determines that the involvement would be inappropriate.”
Among the state-approved professionals who could decide what a child needs are credentialed school psychologists.
The group Our Duty has staked out the position that the bill amounts to “state-sanctioned kidnapping,” according to the Post Millennial.
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Erin Friday, co-leader of Our Duty, said that if a girl were to tell a counselor that she is a boy, the law could be used to send the child to an “LGBTQ housing facility.”
“The parents will have no idea what happened to their child. … Imagine their fear and anxiety. These parents are criminalized without an accusation, evidence or trial,” Friday wrote in a letter to legislators.
Friday said that under AB 665, “California can steal all of the rights of the parents, and hand over medical and mental health decisions to a child who we do not entrust with any other major decision.”
“These bills are all couched in protecting children from suicide but the opposite results occur when you destabilize them by reinforcing the baseless accusations that a child’s loving parents do not have their best interest in mind,” she said.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
