States Sue HHS, RFK Jr. Over Effort To Curtail Gender-Affirming Care For Kids

It's the latest clash between an administration that's cracking down on transgender health care for children, and advocates who say the care is medically necessary.

NEW YORK (AP) — A coalition of 19 states and the District of Columbia on Tuesday sued the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, its secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and its inspector general over a declaration that could complicate access to gender-affirming care for young people.

The declaration issued last Thursday called treatments like puberty blockers, hormone therapy and surgeries unsafe and ineffective for children and adolescents experiencing gender dysphoria, or the distress when someone’s gender expression doesn’t match their sex assigned at birth. It also warned doctors that they could be excluded from federal health programs like Medicare and Medicaid if they provide those types of care.

The declaration came as HHS also announced proposed rules meant to further curtail gender-affirming care for young people, although the lawsuit doesn’t address those as they are not final.

Tuesday’s lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Eugene, Oregon, alleges that the declaration is inaccurate and unlawful and asks the court to block its enforcement. It’s the latest in a series of clashes between an administration that’s cracking down on transgender health care for children, arguing it can be harmful to them, and advocates who say the care is medically necessary and shouldn’t be inhibited.

“Secretary Kennedy cannot unilaterally change medical standards by posting a document online, and no one should lose access to medically necessary health care because their federal government tried to interfere in decisions that belong in doctors’ offices,” New York Attorney General Letitia James, who led the lawsuit, said in a statement Tuesday.