Portugal: President Vetoes Gender Law

The General Framework 

On January 29, the Portuguese government promulgated a law banning “conversion therapy.” This law, discussed last year, was passed on December 21, 2023. Supported by the left, it received the required majority. It condemns “any practice aimed at forced conversion of sexual orientation, gender identity or expression.”

It is still surprising to read that treatments or “surgical, pharmacological, or other interventions which involve irreversible changes to the body and sexual characteristics of the person” are punishable by 5 years of imprisonment. But these same practices, within the framework of “self-determination of gender identity” are not punishable.

The New Bill

This new project, which was approved by parliament on January 15, defines the measures to be adopted by schools to guarantee the right of children and young people to “self-determination of their gender identity and the protection of their sexual characteristics.”

What does this right to self-determination hide? First, the recognition of the change of the first name of students who request it. The plan is for a manager to be appointed in each school to receive requests and implement them if necessary, after consultation with parents.

The second requirement concerns bathrooms. Representatives of the Association of Fathers and Mothers for Freedom of Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (AMPLOS) asked to be received by the President of the Republic, to explain how dramatic it was that the children were not can access all the bathrooms.

The Veto of the President 

President Rebelo de Sousa affirmed that the law which opens the door to the choice of a neutral first name “does not guarantee balance with the essential principle of personal freedom,” while in the case of the law on schools, he considers that it “does not sufficiently respect” the role of families, for which he requested “more realism” from legislators. Parent-teacher associations have also protested against this bill.

The Portuguese president, a practicing Catholic, has already vetoed the law on assisted suicide several times.

The new leader of the Portuguese Socialist Party (PS), Pedro Nuno Santos, has suggested that his party will take up the texts that the country's president vetoed. He also demonstrated his “absolute respect” for the decisions of the President of the Republic, to the extent that he exercises his “constitutional powers.”

Regarding the possibility that the vetoed texts would be taken up again during the next legislature if the Socialists obtain the majority, he indicated that the party “has not changed its point of view,” in statements to the media after meeting in Madrid with Pedro Sánchez, President of the Spanish Government, at the PSOE headquarters.