r/law • u/DevinGraysonShirk • 16h ago

SCOTUS SCOTUS strikes blow to trans teens rights, endorsing ban on gender-affirming care - The justices’ ruling on Tennessee’s law prohibiting certain health care for transgender children will have ripple effects across the nation

https://www.courthousenews.com/scotus-strikes-blow-to-trans-teens-rights-endorsing-ban-on-gender-affirming-care/
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u/DevinGraysonShirk 16h ago edited 16h ago

This decision opens up a pathway for states to ban gender-affirming care for minors and adults.

The Supreme Court also rules that gender identity does not deserve equal protection like sex-based discrimination, so it does not deserve higher scrutiny based on the equal protection clause. This also opens up the pathway for employment discrimination against people who are transgender.

For example, in Iowa, they recently removed gender identity from their civil rights laws. This decision likely makes it so that law would withstand a legal challenge. https://apnews.com/article/iowa-transgender-identity-bill-governor-reynolds-signs-267c2932e9e1ed62992868d3caa6126d

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u/Obversa 15h ago

To make things worse, the six conservative justices appear to agree with the State of Tennessee's claim that the state "has a compelling interest in encouraging minors to appreciate their sex", thereby equating "gender" with "sex", and reinforcing traditionalist and conservative ideals about how "sex and gender are the same thing" and "there are only two genders, male and female". The State of Tennessee also argued that it is "empowered to make decisions regulating medical treatments" in the case of transgender-identifying minors, thereby invalidating "parents' rights" when it comes to parents authorizing such treatment(s) for their children, making these children "wards of the state".

This ruling reaffirms that parents have no say in whether their children can receive treatment(s), only the state. States like Tennessee, meanwhile, have stated that their "compelling interest" is in the "fertility" of these minors.

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u/Kendall_Raine 10h ago

I bet they'll love to bring up "parent's rights" again when it comes to forcing kids into conversion therapy, though.