Supreme Court OKs Tennessee ban on gender-affirming care for kids, a setback for transgender rights

WASHINGTON AP The Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld Tennessee s ban on gender-affirming care for transgender minors a stunning setback to transgender rights The justices - decision in a incident from Tennessee effectively protects from legal challenges countless efforts by President Donald Trump s Republican administration and state governments to roll back protections for transgender people Another states have laws similar to Tennessee s Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for a conservative majority that the law does not violate the Constitution s equal protection clause which requires the authorities to treat similarly situated people the same This episode carries with it the weight of fierce scientific and plan debates about the safety efficacy and propriety of therapeutic 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 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 the bulk the court abandons transgender children and their families to political whims In sadness I dissent The decision 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 ruling body s push to ban transgender athletes in girls sports The Republican president also has sought to block federal spending on gender-affirming diagnostic care for those under age instead promoting talk therapy only to treat young transgender people In addition the Supreme Court has allowed him to kick transgender institution 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 Trump s administration has also called for using only therapy not broader vitality measures to treat transgender youths Several of the states where gender-affirming care has not been banned for minors have adopted laws or state executive orders seeking to protect it But since Trump s executive order calling for blocking federal funding for the restoration for those under a few providers have ceased several treatments For instance Penn Medicine in Philadelphia declared last month that it would not provide surgeries for patients under The president of the American Academy of Pediatrics Dr Susan Kressly stated in a declaration the organization is unwavering in its assistance of gender-affirming care and stands with pediatricians and families making strength care decisions together and free from political interference Kressly announced the Supreme Court s decision sets a dangerous precedent for legislative interference in the practice of medicine and the patient-physician relationship The justices acted a month after the United Kingdom s top court delivered a setback to transgender rights ruling unanimously that the U K Equality Act means trans women can be excluded from specific groups and single-sex spaces like changing rooms homeless shelters swimming areas and medicinal or counseling services provided only to women Five years ago the Supreme Court ruled that transgender people as well as gay and lesbian people are protected by a landmark federal civil rights law that prohibits sex discrimination in the workplace That decision is unaffected by Wednesday s ruling But the justices Wednesday declined to apply the same sort of analysis the court used in when it ascertained sex plays an unmistakable role in employers decisions to punish transgender people for traits and behavior they otherwise tolerate Roberts joined that opinion written by Justice Neil Gorsuch who was part of Wednesday s majority Justice Amy Coney Barrett also fully joined the majority but wrote separately to emphasize that laws classifying people based on transgender status should not receive any special review by courts Barrett also writing for justice Clarence Thomas wrote that courts must give legislatures flexibility to make plan in this area Chase Strangio the American Civil Liberties Union lawyer who argued the situation for transgender minors and their families announced in a announcement that the ruling is a devastating loss for transgender people our families and everyone who cares about the Constitution Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti on social media called the ruling a Landmark ACHIEVEMENT for Tennessee at SCOTUS in defense of America s children There are about people between the ages of and and million adults who identify as transgender in the United States according to the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law The Williams Institute is a think tank that researches sexual orientation and gender identity demographics to inform laws and residents guidelines decisions When the circumstance was argued in December then-President Joe Biden s Democratic administration and families of transgender adolescents called on the high court to strike down the Tennessee ban as unlawful sex discrimination and protect the constitutional rights of vulnerable Americans They argued the law violates the equal protection clause of the th Amendment Tennessee s law bans puberty blockers and hormone treatments for transgender minors but allows the same drugs to be used for other purposes Soon after Trump took office the Justice Department stated the court its position had changed A major issue in the circumstance was the appropriate level of scrutiny courts should apply to such laws The lowest level is known as rational basis review and almost every law looked at that way is upheld Indeed the federal appeals court in Cincinnati that allowed the Tennessee law to be enforced held that lawmakers acted rationally to regulate biological procedures within their authority The appeals court reversed a trial court that employed a higher level of review heightened scrutiny which applies in cases of sex discrimination Under this more searching examination the state must identify an major objective and show the law helps accomplish it Roberts -page majority opinion was devoted almost entirely to explaining why the Tennessee law known as SB should be evaluated under the lower standard of review The law s restrictions on treating minors for gender dysphoria turn on age and curative use not sex Roberts wrote Doctors may prescribe puberty blockers and hormone therapy to minors of any sex to treat specific disorders but not those relating to transgender status he wrote But in her courtroom message Sotomayor asserted that similar arguments were made to defend the Virginia law prohibiting interracial marriage that the Supreme Court struck down in A ban on interracial marriage could be described in the same way as the majority described SB she announced Roberts rejected the comparison in his opinion