WASHINGTON (AP) — Transgender rights advocates are appealing to the conservative-controlled Supreme Court after a presidential election in which Donald Trump and his allies promised to roll back protections for transgender people. There is.
The justices on Wednesday took up the issue of gender-affirming care for transgender minors, which is banned in Tennessee and 25 other Republican-led states.
The fight over whether transgender youth can receive puberty blockers and hormone treatments is part of a broader effort to regulate the lives of transgender people, including the sports they can participate in and the bathrooms they can use.
President Trump supported a national ban on such care as part of his 2024 campaign that disparaged and ridiculed transgender people.
In its waning moments, the Biden administration will stand with the families of transgender young people and urge judges to condemn Tennessee’s ban as unlawful sex discrimination and protect the constitutional rights of vulnerable Americans. Dew.
Chase Strangio, a lawyer representing the families in the Supreme Court, said: “The risks are not only for the transgender youth, but also for the parents who are just watching their child suffer and trying to do the right thing by their child.” “It’s expensive.” In an interview. Strangio, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, will be the first openly transgender person to serve on the high court.
Tennessee lawyers will argue that the “life-altering gender reassignment procedure” is dangerous and unproven, and that it is the state’s role to protect children.
President Trump appointed three justices in his first term, steering the court in a more conservative direction, including a 2022 decision that overturned the landmark Roe v. Wade decision that protected abortion rights for nearly 50 years. I pushed forward.
But Justice Neil Gorsuch, one of President Trump’s appointees, also issued a ruling in 2020 protecting LGBTQ people from workplace discrimination under federal civil rights law.
Both the government and transgender families are relying on this decision to strengthen their case.
The new administration may consider the matter after President Trump takes office on January 20, 2025, but a ruling is expected to wait until spring.
According to the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law, there are approximately 300,000 people between the ages of 13 and 17 in the United States and 1.3 million adults who identify as transgender. The Williams Institute is a think tank that studies the demographics of sexual orientation and gender identity to inform law and public policy decisions.
Most Republican-controlled states have adopted bans similar to Tennessee’s, and these laws are largely enforced despite legal challenges. The Tennessee case will be the first time the U.S. Supreme Court will consider the constitutionality of a ban.
Sivan Kotler Berkowitz, a 20-year-old transgender college student in Massachusetts, said her life would have been very different had she been a few years younger and lived in either state.
“These bans are denying people the opportunity to live and excel,” he said in an interview. “There are thousands of transgender young people across the country who are growing up just like me because they have the love and understanding of their families and the care they deserve.”
Bans in states such as Tennessee leave families in the position of deciding whether to travel for or without ongoing medical care or wait until their child turns 18.
Erin Friday, leader of Our Duty, an international group that supports bans on gender-affirming care for minors, said the case could be as important as Roe v. Wade. She said upholding the Tennessee law would strengthen the case for laws that restrict participation in sports and bathroom use.
Among the arguments made by defenders of the state law is that many children who initially claim they are transgender eventually change their minds. Friday said her daughter came out as transgender when she was 11 years old because it was “instilled in her” at school. But after receiving psychiatric treatment, Friday said her daughter changed her mind. If laws like Tennessee’s are struck down, “many more children will suffer irreparable harm and live lives of deep regret,” Friday said in a Supreme Court filing. Ta.
The World Professional Association for Transgender Health guidelines, revised in 2022, say that although there is little evidence of transition regret, patients should be informed about this possibility during psychological counseling.
Some doctors who work with transgender minors said the state should not intervene between doctors, patients and parents. Dr. Susan Lacy of Memphis, Tenn., who participated, said, “From a medical standpoint, it’s important to us that lawmakers can pass laws that basically determine and regulate what people can do by taking medication based on their diagnosis.” I think it’s really scary and dangerous to think about that.” He said in an interview that he and his family are suing the country.
Michelle Quist Ryder, CEO of the American Psychological Foundation, said the law, if left in place, will have a negative impact on the physical and mental health of transgender people and their supporters. Gender dysphoria (the anxiety a person has when their assigned gender does not match their gender identity) has been linked to depression and suicidal thoughts.
“The more we reduce the sense of safety in this community, the more trans youth will be on the lookout for, ‘Who’s going to come after me?'” she says.
Prominent names are included in some of the 83 briefs submitted by both sides of the case, an unusually high number. Actors Elliott Page and Nicole Maines, and Sarah McBride of Delaware, who became the first openly transgender person elected to Congress in November, joined more than 50 people to push for Tennessee’s law. They are appealing to the court to abolish it.
Tennis legend Martina Navratilova, Olympic swimming gold medalists Donna de Varona and Summer Sanders are among 135 athletes, coaches, officials, and parents who asked the judge that transgender It calls for support for a ban on gender-affirming care for minors.
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