WASHINGTON (AP) — Advocates for transgender rights are turning to a conservative-dominated Supreme Court following the presidential election in which Donald Trump and his allies vowed to roll back protections for transgender people.
The justices on Wednesday will take up the issue of gender-affirming care for transgender minors, which is banned by Tennessee and 25 other Republican-led states.
The battle over whether transgender adolescents have access to puberty blockers and hormonal treatments is part of a broader effort to regulate the lives of transgender people, including which sports competitions they can participate in and which bathrooms they can use.
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Trump supported a national ban on such care as part of his 2024 campaign, in which he demeaned and mocked transgender people.
In its waning days, the Biden administration, along with families of transgender adolescents, will call on the justices to strike down Tennessee’s ban as unlawful sex discrimination and protect the constitutional rights of vulnerable Americans.
“The stakes are high for transgender adolescents, of course, but also for the parents who see their children suffering, who are just trying to do what’s right for their children,” said Chase Strangio, who represents the families at the Supreme Court. in an interview. Strangio, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, will be the first openly transgender person to argue before the Supreme Court.
A Tennessee attorney will argue that “life-changing gender transition procedures” are risky and unproven and that the state’s role is to protect children.
Trump nominated three justices in his first term who pushed the court in a more conservative direction, including the 2022 decision overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling, which had protected abortion rights for nearly 50 years.
Yet one of Trump’s appointees, Judge Neil Gorsuch, also wrote a ruling in 2020 that protected LGBTQ people from workplace discrimination under federal civil rights law.
The government and transgender families are both relying on that decision to strengthen their arguments.
After Trump takes power on January 20, 2025, it is possible that the new administration will look into the matter, which is not expected to be decided until the spring.
According to the Williams Institute at the 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 researches demographic data about sexual orientation and gender identity to inform laws and public policy decisions.
Most Republican-controlled states have passed bans similar to Tennessee’s, and those laws are largely in place despite legal challenges. The Tennessee case marks the first time the nation’s highest court has considered the constitutionality of the bans.
Sivan Kotler-Berkowitz, a 20-year-old student in Massachusetts who is transgender, said his life would have been very different if he had been just a few years younger and lived in one of the states.
“These bans deny people the opportunity to live and excel,” he said in an interview. “There are thousands of transgender youth across the country who are doing well just like me because we have had the love and understanding of our families and because we have had access to good care.”
The bans in Tennessee and elsewhere have put families in the position of deciding whether to travel for ongoing health care, go without it or wait until their children turn 18.
Erin Friday, leader of Our Duty, an international group that supports bans on gender-affirming care for minors, said the case will be as important as Roe v. Wade. She said enforcing Tennessee’s law would strengthen the case for laws restricting sports participation and restroom use.
One of the arguments made by defenders of the state’s laws is that many children who initially say they are transgender eventually change their minds. Friday said her daughter was 11 when she said she was transgender, which Friday attributed to the child being “indoctrinated” at school. But after undergoing psychiatric treatment, her daughter changed her mind, Friday said. If laws like Tennessee’s are struck down, “more children would suffer irreversible harm and live lives of deep regret,” Friday said in a filing with the Supreme Court.
Guidelines from the World Professional Association for Transgender Health revised in 2022 say there is little evidence of regret about transitioning, but also that patients should be told about the possibility during psychological counseling.
Some doctors who work with transgender minors believe there should be no state between doctors, their patients and parents. “From a medical perspective, I think it’s really scary and dangerous to think that lawmakers could pass a law that actually assesses or controls what people can do with a drug based on a diagnosis,” Dr. Susan Lacy of Memphis, Tenn., who joins the families suing the state, said in an interview.
Michelle Quist Ryder, CEO of the American Psychological Foundation, said the laws, if left in place, would harm the physical and mental health of transgender people and their supporters. Gender dysphoria – the discomfort a person may have when their assigned sex and gender identity do not match – has been linked to depression and suicidal ideation.
“The more we reduce the sense of safety in this community, the trans youth are going to look out and say, ‘Who else is coming after me?’” she said.
There are prominent names in some of the 83 court papers, an unusually high number, filed on both sides of the case. Actors Elliot Page and Nicole Maines, and Sarah McBride of Delaware, who in November became the first openly transgender person to win election to Congress, have joined more than five dozen people in urging the court to overturn the law. Tennessee to be deleted.
Tennis legend Martina Navratilova and Olympic gold medalists Donna de Varona and Summer Sanders are among 135 athletes, coaches, officials and parents who want judges to uphold the ban on gender-affirming care for transgender minors.
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Mulvihill reported from Cherry Hill, New Jersey. AP Medical writer Carla K. Johnson in Seattle and Associated Press writer Lindsay Whitehurst contributed to this article.
