Transgender care bans for Kentucky, Tennessee minors partly blocked
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Judges in Kentucky and Tennessee on Wednesday temporarily halted some restrictions on gender-affirming care for transgender youths shortly before the provisions were set to go into effect. Both federal courts blocked parts of respective state laws that would have prevented transgender minors from receiving hormone therapy and puberty blockers, which the Kentucky court described as “appropriate and medically necessary” in some cases. In Tennessee, the judge did not go as far as blocking a ban on surgeries for minors; in Kentucky, the case did not directly discuss surgeries.
Litigation between the states and plaintiffs is ongoing, and the blocks could ultimately be reversed, though both judges said they did not find aspects of the states’ arguments convincing.
The legal interventions come as conservative states seek to pass laws targeting LGBTQ+ individuals and set up obstacles for those seeking to access gender-affirming health care, use bathrooms corresponding to one’s gender identity, and discuss gender and sexuality in schools.
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Despite major medical organizations opposing bans on gender-affirming health care for minors, 20 U.S. states have enacted laws that restrict such treatments, according to the Human Rights Campaign. But such bans have repeatedly faced roadblocks when challenged in federal courts. Last week a similar ban in Arkansas was struck down, as well as a Florida ban on using Medicaid for certain treatments for gender dysphoria. Federal judges have also partially blocked bans in Alabama and Indiana.
“To the Court’s knowledge, every court to consider preliminarily enjoining a ban on gender-affirming care for minors has found that such a ban is likely unconstitutional,” U.S. District Judge Eli Richardson, a Trump administration appointee, wrote in the Wednesday ruling.
“If Tennessee wishes to regulate access to certain medical procedures,” Richardson wrote, “it must do so in a manner that does not infringe on the rights conferred by the United States Constitution, which is of course supreme to all other laws of the land.”
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U.S. District Judge David Hale, an Obama administration appointee, wrote in the Kentucky ruling that the treatments barred by state law SB150 are “medically appropriate and necessary for some transgender children under the evidence-based standard of care accepted by all major medical organizations in the United States,” adding that “these drugs have a long history of safe use in minors for various conditions.”
Kentucky State Attorney General Daniel Cameron, the Republican candidate for governor, called the decision “misguided” in a statement on Twitter and said that SB 150 is a “commonsense law that protects Kentucky children” against medical treatments he describes as harmful.
In March, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear (D) vetoed SB 150, which he said allowed the government “too much interference in personal healthcare issues,” but his veto was overridden.
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The Kentucky lawsuit was brought by seven transgender minors and their parents, and the original court filing details what is at stake for transgender children under SB150’s provisions.
For one minor in the case, a 14-year-old transgender girl, taking estrogen provided a “comfort and joy that her parents had never seen in her before,” court documents said.
Another child, a 12-year-old transgender boy, became depressed and suicidal when he started menstruating, “because of the mismatch between his body and his sense of himself as a boy,” the filing said. According to court documents, his parents fear that the ban — which would prohibit him from gender dysphoria treatment, including menstruation suppressants — will once again cause his mental health to deteriorate.
The ACLU released statements celebrating the blocks in Kentucky and Tennessee. Lucas Cameron-Vaughn, ACLU of Tennessee staff attorney, said in a statement that the Tennessee ruling “acknowledges the dangerous implications of this law and protects the freedom to access vital, lifesaving health care for trans youth and their families while our challenge proceeds.”
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Source: The Washington Post
