Trans CPS Investigator Resigns Rather Than Support Texas’ Anti-Trans Policies

By I’m From Driftwood

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Morgan Davis, a trans man from Austin, Texas, was working as an investigator with Child Protective Services (CPS) when the governor asked the agency to begin investigating parents providing gender-affirming care to their children. In his first such case, what he saw was an impeccable household and a thriving trans child. Despite wanting to close the case and leave the family in peace, Morgan was instead told that the investigation would stay open and continue. When the family chose to sue the state, Morgan decided to sign on to an amicus brief in support, ultimately leading to his resignation and the resignation of his entire unit. Fortunately, he later found work with the Travis County District Attorney’s Office – this time working on the side of the families to protect them from discriminatory anti-trans policies.

Transcript provided by YouTube:

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I’m Morgan Davis. I’m from Austin, Texas. A year ago, I was an investigator with Child Protective Services. At the time, Governor Abbott, the Texas governor, asked us to look into parents providing gender-affirming care to their children. On a Wednesday night, I received a phone call from my supervisor. It was within 24 hours of receiving a letter from Governor Abbott. The supervisor said, “We have a case, and it’s yours if you’re up for it. You can recuse yourself if you want to.” I said I wanted it, and then I was told it was a colleague. At that point, I’d only been transitioned about a year, and my boss knew that. I guess in hindsight, I really hope that maybe it wasn’t just happenstance that they were showing my colleague Grace in, allowing a trans man to go in. What I saw was impeccable. I went into the home. This was the easiest case I’d ever had, genuinely, it was a slam dunk.

The child was thriving. I saw a family providing their child with medically necessary care. So, immediately, I went outside to staff the case with my supervisor. I’m on the phone with my supervisor, “Impeccable, let’s close it.” No, unfortunately, we can’t close it. “Why are we keeping it open?” They wanted to discuss it further. “What are we discussing? This child is thriving.” I mean, thriving. Lambda Legal had provided them with attorneys even before I arrived on site. I walked back into the house and talked to the mom’s attorney, and I think she knew. I genuinely look back now, and we’ve spoken to each other since then. She said she knew it was something else. She could see what was coming. She’d been doing this for a long time. I was walking out with her, and it just hits like a ton of bricks. She told me when I was leaving, she said, “You know you shouldn’t be here.” Because it didn’t matter if I was trans, and it didn’t matter if I was kind. I couldn’t make it stop. The case was going to go forward. I said, “Well, why? Why?” At that point, I just thought, “Please, God, sue. Please, somebody, sue.” And they did.

The hearing was broadcast live for the family when they decided to come forward. I received a text from my supervisor, “Have you been subpoenaed to testify?” I asked, “Do you mind me asking why?” Instead, are you watching? I said, “I’m watching.” I said, “Look up,” and a supervisor was walking toward. She had resigned that morning and come forward. I wish you could have been in the room. I mean, literally, the room just lit up because we had a shot at this. I received an email asking, “Do you want to sign on to the Amicus brief?” And they even said, “They were awful nice. They said it can be anonymous.” A lot of the people did it anonymously because they wanted to save their careers, their jobs. It didn’t feel right.

So, the only thing I had – it felt like – if I signed it with my name, my real name, and said, “My name is Morgan Davis, and I’m an adult, a trans man, and I’m an investigator, and this family is telling the truth,” it felt like the right thing to do. By signing the Amicus brief, I had basically turned in my resignation letter. Not only come out publicly as a trans individual, I had, at that point, we were told the single thing that we could do is to come forward. I hung on for about a month, and at that point, our entire unit had resigned. I had a bit of a hard time finding a job. Ironically, I currently work for the Travis County District Attorney’s office for the Special Victims Unit, which is the attorney for CPS. So, it’s so interesting, wrap-up, you know? Amazingly, I – I was asked as an investigator to investigate these families for gender-affirming care. Whereas ironically, working with the District Attorney’s Office of Travis County, I asked to protect these families. How do we keep these children safe? How, moving forward, do we make sure that they are taken care of? It’s letting a child be a child as they want to be a child. It was described to me as this, “I said I need to get you from point A to point B. I might not know what that looks like, but I know as an adult, I’m going to get you there because point B is where you’re thriving.”

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This post was previously published on YouTube.

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