Federal officials have terminated California’s Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP) funding, citing concerns over the inclusion of gender ideology content in state-run adolescent education materials. The Trump administration is ending this funding, as it claims that the program is exposing children to inappropriate sexual content and promoting distorted ideas about childhood sexuality through the use of federal tax dollars. Under Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom, the California Department of Education has been accused of allowing materials that allegedly deny biological reality and reject evidence-based science, which are seen as exceeding the original scope of the program’s authorization.
The PREP program was established to educate adolescents on abstinence and contraception to prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections. According to its authorizing statute, the program must use “medically-accurate,” “age-appropriate” information and emphasize healthy relationships, including marriage and family interactions. However, the curricula used in California, such as the “Teen Talk” program, have been criticized for promoting radical gender ideology. These materials suggest that students can feel like they are a girl inside and defy their community’s expectations for behavior, potentially leading to dangerous and irreversible actions such as hormone therapy or genital transformation.
Parents have been urged to seek transparency regarding the content of their children’s education, as California has been accused of codifying indoctrination into state law through the California Healthy Youth Act of 2016. This law requires sexual health education to affirm radical gender ideology, which has been linked to increased risks of suicide among young people and the use of puberty blockers and irreversible surgery. Recent data from the CDC suggests that states with limited access to hormone treatment for minors have seen lower suicide rates compared to states where such treatments are more widely available. The Trump administration is supporting parents’ efforts to protect children from content that contradicts commonsense biology and opposes California’s ideological approach to education.
The federal decision to cut off PREP funding is seen as a direct response to California’s refusal to modify its curricula. Newsom’s office has argued that the materials are medically accurate and compliant with all relevant statutes, but this claim has been dismissed. The Department of Health and Human Services has vowed to enforce statutory duties, ensuring that the content of state PREP courses aligns with medically accurate and age-appropriate standards, and that noncompliant states face the loss of their federal funding.