Watch: Jon Stewart Confronts Anti-Trans Pol with Facts, Demolishes Myths

Former "Daily Show" host Jon Stewart confronted an anti-transgender Arkansas official with the facts about trans youth in a preview for an upcoming episode of "The Problem with Jon Stewart" – and the six-minute clip is winning Stewart plaudits.

The secret sauce for the interview's success? Stewart calmly sticks to facts, but when he asks Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge for a similarly fact-based defense of the state's criminalizing of medically-appropriate care for transgender youth, the best she can come up with are vague assertions about supposed witnesses testifying that "98% of the young people who have gender dysphoria that they are able to move past that, and once they have the help that they need no longer suffer from gender dysphoria."

"Wow," Stewart responds. "That's an incredibly made up figure. That doesn't comport with any of the studies or figures that exist from these medical organizations."

When Stewart presses Rutledge to back up her claims by naming a specific medical association making claims of a 98% cure rate for youth with gender dysphoria, she defaults to similar vague claims about having "all of that in our legislative history, and we'll be glad to provide that to you. I don't have the name of that off the top of my head."

Stewart continues to pursue a fact-based line of questioning, noting that Rutledge is "suggesting that 'protecting children' means overriding the recommendations of the American Medical Association, the American Association of Pediatrics, the Endocrine Society."

Rutledge eventually resorts to the anti-trans argument that the long process of treating transgender children – which includes allowing them to dress, present, and identify as the gender that aligns with their identity, and may include the use of puberty blockers – constitutes an "irreversible step..." Such steps are, however, easily reversible.

The coded language of "irreversible" treatments is often paired with claims that young children undergo gender confirmation surgery – a claim that is untrue.

When Rutledge attempts to deny Stewart's comparison between the state forbidding medically appropriate treatment for children with gender dysphoria with a theoretical scenario of the state trying to intervene in, and criminalize, treatment for pediatric cancer, Stewart lays it on the line:

"I've got some bad news for you. Parents with children who have gender dysphoria have lost children to suicide and depression."

Stewart goes on to add: "I'm confused why you follow AMA guidelines and [AAP] guidelines for all other health issues in Arkansas... but not for this."

Rutledge eventually resorts to declaring that she's not prepared "to have a Supreme Court argument" with Stewart about the issue. It isn't a good look.

Twitter users took note of Stewart's clean, calm line of questioning versus the vague and contradictory nature of Rutledge's responses. They also took note of how, as one Twitter post put it, Stewart's approach seemed like "a breath of fresh air" compared to the hyper-partisan nature of many similar debates.

MSNBC noted that "the interview didn't break any new ground. But what it did do was give liberals a high profile, simple template for pushing back against relentless right-wing attacks on trans medicine."

The Human Rights Campaign issued a statement that praised Stewart's clear-cut line of questioning, and cut through the anti-trans myth-making. The statement offered additional quotes from the episode, including Stewart noting, "Anti-trans legislation increased over 800% since 2018. 800%. What could justify this unprecedented urgency? Did trans people storm the Capitol? Did they steal classified nuclear intel from the White House and keep it in a humidor in Florida? What is the threat?"

The HRC followed Stewart's lead, offering fact-based information about the kind of care that's widely accepted by experts as necessary and appropriate for transgender youth, and dispatching a number of myths about care for transgender children.

"Parents, their kids, and doctors make decisions together, and no medical interventions with permanent consequences happen until a transgender person is old enough to give truly informed consent," the statement noted.

The statement went on to explain, "Gender transition is a personal process that can include changing clothes, names, and hairstyles to fit a person's gender identity," and pointed out that "None of this care is irreversible."

Added the HRC: "And very few transgender people change their mind."

Information on the HRC website notes that those few who do de-transition typically cite factors external to themselves, and do not identify regret over having received gender affirmation treatment as the motivation. Rather, HRC noted, a study from The Fenway Institute and Massachusetts General Hospital (Harvard Medical School) "found that 13.1% of currently identified transgender people have detransitioned at some point in their lives, but that 82.5% of those who have detransitioned attribute their decision to at least one external factor such as pressure from family, non-affirming school environments, and increased vulnerability to violence, including sexual assault."

The full episode is available to view for free ot Apple TV+.