Northwestern law expert on U.S. Supreme Court allowing ban on gender-affirming care for minors
“The fight to protect access to life-saving health care will continue,” expert says
CHICAGO --- The Supreme Court upheld Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors today in a 6-3 decision. “This is a major setback to trans rights and to equal protection doctrine,” says Kara Ingelhart, director of the LGBTQI+ Rights Clinic and clinical assistant professor of law at Northwestern Pritzker School of Law.
Professor Ingelhart is available to speak with media.
In their dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor and her liberal colleagues, wrote that the majority “abandons transgender children and their families to political whims.”
The decision makes way for state governments to roll back protections for transgender people. Twenty-six states have laws similar to Tennessee that ban access to gender-affirming care for minors.
QUOTE FROM INGELHART:
“I agree whole-heartedly with Justice Sotomayor’s dissenting words critiquing the majority’s gymnastic approach to the question of sex-based discrimination and its holding that denying health care to one group (trans kids for gender dysphoria), but not another (cis kids for precocious puberty or other diagnoses) survives rational basis.
“Although I’m personally feeling devastated and I’m deeply concerned for the community, this setback doesn’t take away other tools in our belts as advocates including other live claims in this case as well as community organizing. The fight to protect access to life-saving health care will continue. The cases that say it violates equal protection to target a disfavored minority based on animus still apply. That is precisely what advocates against the rights of trans and gender diverse folx are doing, so those arguments remain.”
To set up an interview with Professor Ingelhart, reach out to Shanice Harris at shanice.harris@northwestern.edu.