Parents in California lost custody of their daughter after opposing a child’s gender transition. Alexandra Lyashchenko and her husband, both Ukrainian immigrants, lost custody of their 15-year-old daughter in 2024 after they opposed her desire for gender transition. California authorities called the Lyashchenkos “culturally unfit for raising [their] daughter in present-day America.” California has placed the child in foster care and is moving toward the adoption process into another family. When disagreement over so-called gender transitions becomes grounds for state intervention, the line between child welfare and ideological enforcement grows dangerously thin. In 2022, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill, SB 107, that allows California courts to take “emergency jurisdiction” of children who come to the state for “gender transitions.”