Supreme Court OKs Tennessee ban on gender-affirming care for kids

Judge: Prisons must provide hormones for transgender inmates

A federal judge ruled that the Bureau of Prisons must continue to provide hormone therapy to hundreds of transgender inmates. In his ruling, U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth said that federal law prohibits prison officials from withholding medications and other accommodations to inmates that have been deemed appropriate by the bureau’s own medical staff.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for transgender minors, a setback to transgender rights.

There are about 300,000 people between the ages of 13 and 17 and 1.3 million adults who identify as transgender in the United States, according to the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law. 

Court OKs Tennessee ban on gender-affirming care for children

The justices' 6-3 decision in a case from Tennessee effectively protects from legal challenges many efforts by President Donald Trump's Republican administration and state governments to roll back protections for transgender people. Another 26 states have laws similar to Tennessee's.

Tennessee's law prohibits medical treatments like puberty blockers or hormone therapy for transgender adolescents under the age of 18.

What they're saying:

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for a conservative majority that the law does not violate the Constitution's equal protection clause, which requires the government to treat similarly situated people the same.

FILE: Protesters rally in front of the Supreme Court in 2018. (Credit: Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

"This case carries with it the weight of fierce scientific and policy debates about the safety, efficacy, and propriety of medical treatments in an evolving field. The voices in these debates raise sincere concerns; the implications for all are profound," Roberts wrote. "The Equal Protection Clause does not resolve these disagreements. Nor does it afford us license to decide them as we see best."

The other side:

In a dissent for the court's three liberal justices that she summarized aloud in the courtroom, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote, "By retreating from meaningful judicial review exactly where it matters most, the court abandons transgender children and their families to political whims. In sadness, I dissent."

What is Trump’s order on gender transition care for minors?

The backstory:

President Donald Trump signed an executive order after taking office directing federally run insurance programs to exclude coverage for gender-affirming care. That included Medicaid, which covered such services in some states, and TRICARE for military families. 

Trump’s order also called on the Justice Department to pursue litigation and legislation to oppose the practice.

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The decision also comes amid a range of other federal and state efforts to regulate the lives of transgender people, including which sports competitions they can join and which bathrooms they can use. 

In April, Trump’s administration sued Maine for not complying with the government’s push to ban transgender athletes in girls sports.

The Republican president also has sought to block federal spending on gender-affirming medical care for those under age 19 — instead promoting talk therapy only to treat young transgender people. In addition, the Supreme Court has allowed him to kick transgender service members out of the military, even as court fights continue. The president also signed another order to define the sexes as only male and female.