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gender-affirming healthcare
Democratic State AGs Vow to Fight Trump's Attacks on Transgender People
"We will not let the president turn back the clock or deter us from upholding California values," said Rob Bonta, the state's attorney general.
Feb 05, 2025
Fifteen Democratic state attorneys issued a joint statement Wednesday vowing to protect access to gender-affirming healthcare amid the Trump administration's attacks on transgender people, which include a new executive order aiming to ban trans girls and women from competing on female sports teams.
"We stand firmly in support of healthcare policies that respect the dignity and rights of all people," the attorneys general said in a statement decrying Republican President Donald Trump's January 28 executive order banning federal support for gender-affirming care—which the president described as "chemical and surgical mutilation"—for young adults and minors under the age of 19.
"Healthcare decisions should be made by patients, families, and doctors, not by a politician trying to use his power to restrict your freedoms," the statement continues. "Gender-affirming care is essential, lifesaving medical treatment that supports individuals in living as their authentic selves."
"The Trump administration's recent executive order is wrong on the science and the law," the attorneys general asserted. "Despite what the Trump administration has suggested, there is no connection between 'female genital mutilation' and gender-affirming care, and no federal law makes gender-affirming care unlawful. President Trump cannot change that by executive order."
"State attorneys general will continue to enforce state laws that provide access to gender-affirming care, in states where such enforcement authority exists, and we will challenge any unlawful effort by the Trump administration to restrict access to it in our jurisdictions," they added.
The attorneys general of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Nevada, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wisconsin signed the statement.
"California supports the rights of transgender youth to live their lives as their authentic selves," California Attorney General Rob Bonta said in a statement Wednesday. "We will not let the president turn back the clock or deter us from upholding California values."
"I understand that the president's executive order on gender-affirming care has created some confusion," Bonta added. "Let me be clear: California law has not changed, and hospitals and clinics have a legal obligation to provide equal access to healthcare services."
The statement from the 15 attorneys general came on the same day that Trump signed an executive order titled "Keeping Men Out of Women's Sports" that directs the Department of Education—which the president has vowed to abolish—to notify school districts that allowing transgender girls and women to compete on female teams violates Title IX, the federal law prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sex in education.
The executive order also directs the administration to "convene representatives of major athletic organizations and governing bodies, and female athletes harmed by such policies," and "convene state attorneys general to identify best practices in defining and enforcing equal opportunities for women to participate in sports and educate them about stories of women and girls who have been harmed by male participation in women's sports."
Wednesday's directive is the latest salvo in Trump's war on transgender people, which includes a day one executive order declaring that only two genders exist, another order advocating action against educators who "facilitate the social transition of a minor," a reinstatement of his first-term ban on new military enlistment by trans people—who, according to the White House, cannot lead an "honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle"—nominating a transphobe to head the Justice Department's civil rights office, and scrubbing all mention of transgender people and issues from federal agency websites.
Trans people and their allies are fighting back. Lawsuits have been filed
challenging restrictions on access to gender-affirming healthcare and the transfer of transgender women inmates to men's prisons. On Wednesday, a federal judge appointed by former Republican President Ronald Reagan temporarily blocked federal prisons from moving transgender women to men's facilities and cutting off their access to hormone therapy, citing the Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment. At least two federal judges have also issued temporary restraining orders on Trump administration efforts to freeze funding for federal agencies and programs.
Protests in defense of gender-affirming healthcare and other trans rights have also taken place at hospitals and other locations across the country as Trump and allies including Department of Government Efficiency chief Elon Musk pressure the U.S. Treasury Department to defund any programs specifically helping transgender and other LGBTQ+ people.
"The protection of marginalized communities will not come solely from elected officials or bureaucratic processes—it will come from sustained, organized resistance," trans rights activist Erin Reed wrote Wednesday. "History shows that real power lies not in centralized institutions but in the collective action of those who refuse to be divided."
"Authoritarian governments rely on fragmentation, banking on the idea that the public will see themselves as isolated rather than interconnected," Reed added. "As protests grow and solidarity strengthens across movements, the coming months may test just how powerful a unified public can be."
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Trump Bans Federal Support for Gender-Affirming Healthcare Up to Age 19
"This order will kill kids, there's no other way to say it," asserted one critic.
Jan 28, 2025
In his administration's latest attack on LGBTQ+ Americans, Republican U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday issued an executive order banning the federal government from supporting a wide range of gender-affirming healthcare for transgender youth.
Trump's order—titled "Protecting Children From Chemical and Surgical Mutilation"—states that the federal government "will not fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support the so-called 'transition' of a child from one sex to another, and it will rigorously enforce all laws that prohibit or limit these destructive and life-altering procedures."
"Child" is defined in the order as anyone younger than 19—including 18-year-old adults. The directive covers treatments and procedures including gender-affirming surgeries, puberty blockers, and hormone replacement therapy. The ban will adversely affect people who rely upon federal programs including Medicare, Medicaid, and TRICARE, through which the Department of Defense provides health coverage for nearly 2 million youth dependents.
This order will kill kids, there's no other way to say it. It's the government forcibly taking control of the bodies of thousands of children.
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— Katelyn Burns (@katelynburns.com) January 28, 2025 at 3:19 PM
Furthermore, the order—which is almost certain to be challenged in court—places hospitals, clinics, and other providers of gender-affirming care at risk of losing federal funding.
"This executive order is a brazen attempt to put politicians in between people and their doctors, preventing them from accessing evidence-based healthcare supported by every major medical association in the country," Kelly Robinson, president of the LGBTQ+ advocacy group Human Rights Campaign, said in a statement. "It is deeply unfair to play politics with people's lives and strip transgender young people, their families, and their providers of the freedom to make necessary healthcare decisions."
"Questions about this care should be answered by doctors—not politicians—and decisions must rest with families, doctors, and the patient," Robinson added. "Everyone deserves the freedom to make deeply personal healthcare decisions for themselves and their families—no matter your income, zip code, or health coverage."
Trump made opposing rights for transgender people—especially children—a major part of his 2024 campaign, as it was during his first term.
The president's executive order claims that "medical professionals are maiming and sterilizing a growing number of impressionable children under the radical and false claim that adults can change a child's sex through a series of irreversible medical interventions."
"This dangerous trend will be a stain on our nation's history, and it must end," asserts the directive, which dubiously claims that "countless children soon regret that they have been mutilated and begin to grasp the horrifying tragedy that they will never be able to conceive children of their own or nurture their children through breastfeeding."
However, trans advocate Erin Reed pushed back, noting on social media that "detransition is rare, 1-4% in most studies, and regret even lower."
Furthermore, many doctors and medical experts agree that gender-affirming care saves the lives of trans youth, who are at higher risk of suicide and other self-harm, partly due to discrimination, bullying, and other societal pressures.
Trans people and their allies are already fighting back against Trump's policies. On Tuesday, half a dozen active-duty transgender U.S. troops and two people seeking to join the military sued to block a revival of the president's first-term ban on trans people enlisting in the armed forces.
The previous day, a transgender woman inmate in a federal women's prison sued the Trump administration over a recent executive order narrowly defining sex, arguing it is motivated by hate, violates the Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment, and places her in mortal danger if she is transferred to a men's facility as ordered by the government.
In stark contrast with the direction in which Trump is steering the U.S., health officials in Thailand—which last year became the first nation in Southeast Asia to legalize same-sex marriage equality—this week announced a multimillion-dollar initiative to provide gender-affirming care for 200,000 transgender people in the country.
Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra said last week that the marriage equality law, which went into effect this month, "marks the beginning of Thai society's greater awareness of gender diversity, and our embrace of everyone regardless of sexual orientation, race, or religion—our affirmation that everyone is entitled to equal rights and dignity."
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Trans Inmate Sues Trump Over 'Dangerous' Gender Policy Forcing Transfer to Men's Prison
"Courts have already found that forcing trans women into men's prisons is cruel and unusual punishment," noted one media outlet.
Jan 27, 2025
A transgender woman inmate serving her sentence in a women's federal prison sued the Trump administration on Sunday, arguing that Republican U.S. President Donald Trump's recent executive order narrowly defining sex violates the Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment, is "motivated by discriminatory animus" toward trans people, and forces "dangerous transfers to men's facilities."
A redacted copy of the lawsuit—which was filed by an inmate in an unspecified low-security federal prison identified as "Maria Moe"—claims Trump's January 20 executive order stating that it is henceforth federal policy "to recognize two sexes, male and female" violates her constitutional rights.
"Defendant Trump has been transparent about his hostility toward transgender people and openly stated his intentions to create legal obstacles to eliminate legal protections for transgender people and to deter them from obtaining medical care or being able to live in a sex other than their birth sex," the lawsuit states.
On Sunday, a transgender woman who is currently in prison sued Donald Trump, Acting A.G. McHenry, and the head of the Bureau of Prisons due to her treatment in the wake of the Jan. 20 anti-trans "sex" definition executive order. Read it all at Law Dork: www.lawdork.com/p/trans-woma...
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— Chris Geidner (@chrisgeidner.bsky.social) January 27, 2025 at 10:52 AM
"On November 15, 2022, when he announced his candidacy for president, he explicitly promised to target transgender Americans through executive action," the complaint continues. "He pledged a 'day one' executive order to 'cease all programs that promote the concept of sex and gender transition at any age.'"
"If Maria Moe is transferred to a men's facility, she will not be safe," the lawsuit stresses. "Transferring Maria Moe to a men's prison will pose a substantial risk of serious harm, including an extremely high risk of violence and sexual assault from other incarcerated people and [Federal Bureau of Prisons] staff."
"In a men's prison, Maria Moe will also be at high risk of worsening gender dysphoria, which can lead to serious physical and mental health conditions including severe depression and suicidality," the complaint adds. "These risks are obvious, well-documented, and well-known to BOP officials."
Furthermore, the suit says that ending Moe's federally funded hormone therapy "would constitute deliberate indifference to her serious medical needs and would violate the 8th Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment."
As
LGBTQ Nationreported Monday, "Courts have already found that forcing trans women into men's prisons is cruel and unusual punishment."
According to the very small print on the BOP's "inmate gender" webpage, there are 1,529 transgender females in federal custody and 744 transgender males.
The new lawsuit preceded Monday reporting that Trump is expected to revive his first-term policy of banning new military enlistments by transgender people.
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