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Los Angeles Times
18-06-2025
- Politics
- Los Angeles Times
The Supreme Court failed when it decided against gender affirming care
The Supreme Court's decision upholding a Tennessee ban on gender affirming care for transgender youth is a tragic abdication of the judiciary's responsibility to protect minorities. In 1937, in United States vs. Carolene Products, the court famously explained that while courts usually should defer to the political process, deference is unwarranted when there is discrimination against 'discrete and insular minorities,' groups that are unlikely to be able to protect themselves against discrimination. Transgender youth are obviously such a minority, but the Supreme Court, in a 6-3 ruling divided along ideological lines, abandoned them. The issue before the Supreme Court was whether Tennessee may prohibit puberty blocking hormones from being administered to transgender teenagers. Twenty-six states, all with Republican-controlled state legislatures, have banned gender affirming care for minors. It is estimated that there are 110,000 transgender individuals in these states who will be prevented from having the medical care that they, their parents and their doctors want administered. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., writing for the majority in United States vs. Skrmetti, stressed the need for the court to defer to the judgment of the Tennessee Legislature. He concluded his opinion by saying the issue is left 'to the people, their elected representatives, and the democratic process.' Likewise, Justice Clarence Thomas, in a concurring opinion, said: 'Deference to legislatures, not experts, is particularly critical here.' But such deference is inappropriate and unwarranted under Supreme Court precedents when a law burdens a group that has been historically subjected to discrimination. Such discrimination is present in this case in two ways. First, the Tennessee law discriminates on the basis of sex. Roberts' majority opinion contends that denying the medical care doesn't amount to sex discrimination because all children are prohibited from receiving gender affirming care. But this ignores that the law allows certain hormones to be given to boys and not girls, and vice versa. That, by definition, is sex discrimination. Justice Sonia Sotomayor explained it this way in her dissenting opinion: 'Sex determines access to the covered medication. Physicians in Tennessee can prescribe hormones and puberty blockers to help a male child, but not a female child, look more like a boy; and to help a female child, but not a male child, look more like a girl.' Second, the law discriminates against transgender youth. Roberts rejects this as well, saying the law 'does not classify on the basis of transgender status.' But that is exactly what the law does: It singles out transgender youth and bars them from receiving certain medical care. In justifying the majority's conclusion, the court relies on one of the most ridiculed decisions in history. Geduldig vs. Aiello (1974) held that excluding pregnancy, and only pregnancy, from disability coverage was not sex discrimination. The decision said there are two categories of people: non-pregnant persons and pregnant persons, and because women are in both categories discrimination based on pregnancy is not sex discrimination. As Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg later remarked, Geduldig was 'egregiously wrong': 'pregnancy discrimination is inevitably sex discrimination.' Roberts' logic works this way: There are those who would use the hormonal treatment for gender affirming care, which is prohibited by the Tennessee law, and those who would use the hormonal treatment for other purposes, which is allowed. Because transgender individuals can be in both groups, there is no discrimination against them. But of course this ignores that the entire purpose of the law is prohibiting medical treatments that doctors, parents and transgender youth believe is appropriate. It also leads to absurd conclusions, as Sotomayor noted: The court's approach would mean that 'a law depriving all individuals who 'have ever, or may someday, menstruate' of access to health insurance would be sex neutral merely because not all women menstruate.' By ignoring the discrimination inherent in the Tennessee law, the court avoided applying heightened scrutiny to the case. If that level of scrutiny had been applied, it would not have been possible to merely defer to the Tennessee Legislature. The court would have had to address whether the medical care prohibitions were justified, as did the federal district court in this case. The lower court, looking carefully at the evidence, found that the overall weight of authority supports gender affirming care for transgender youth. The human costs of upholding state laws prohibiting gender affirming care will be enormous. As Sotomayor noted, 'Tragically, studies suggest that as many as one-third of transgender high school students attempt suicide in any given year.' She added: 'By retreating from meaningful judicial review exactly where it matters most, the Court abandons transgender children and their families to political whims.' The implications extend beyond the prohibitions in Tennessee and other states against gender affirming care. The Trump administration has barred transgender individuals from serving in the military without providing the slightest basis for its action other than prejudice. It also is aggressively seeking to end federal support for gender affirming care for patients of all ages. The Supreme Court's Skrmetti decision suggests its willingness to uphold such actions. Sadly, the conservative justices took sides in the culture wars and in doing so abandoned both long-standing constitutional principles and transgender individuals. Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Berkeley Law School, is an Opinion voices contributing writer.
New York Times
18-06-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Live Updates: Supreme Court Upholds Ban on Transgender Care for Minors
Pinned The Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld a Tennessee law that prohibits some medical treatments for transgender youths, rejecting arguments that it violated the Constitution and shielding similar laws in more than 20 other states. The decision, which came amid the Trump administration's fierce assaults on transgender rights, was a bitter setback for their proponents, who only five years ago celebrated a decision by the court to protect transgender people from workplace discrimination. The vote was 6 to 3, with the court's three liberal members in dissent. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., writing for the majority, acknowledged the 'fierce scientific and policy debates about the safety, efficacy and propriety of medical treatments in an evolving field. The voices in these debates raise sincere concerns; the implications for all are profound.' But he said these questions should be resolved by 'the people, their elected representatives and the democratic process.' The Tennessee law was enacted in 2023, amid a sweeping national pushback to expanding rights for transgender people. Since then, controversies about military service, athletes, bathrooms and pronouns have played a role in President Trump's second-term agenda. The law prohibits medical providers from prescribing puberty-delaying medication, offering hormone therapy or performing surgery to treat the psychological distress caused by incongruence between experienced gender and that assigned at birth. The doctor and three families who sued to challenge the Tennessee law said it discriminated based on both sex and transgender status in violation of the Constitution's equal protection clause. They noted that the law specified that those prohibited treatments were allowed when undertaken for reasons other than gender transition care. In a measure of the shifting politics around transgender issues, the Biden administration intervened on their side. After Mr. Trump took office, his administration issued an executive order directing agencies to take steps to curtail surgeries, hormone therapy and other gender transition care for youths under 19. And in February, his administration formally reversed the government's position in the case and urged the justices to uphold the law. The briefs in the case before the Supreme Court, United States v. Skrmetti, No. 23-477, surveyed the medical evidence, with the challengers stressing that the major American medical associations support the prohibited treatments as crucial for alleviating the psychological distress of many transgender youths. Tennessee's brief countered that scientific uncertainty meant that legislatures rather than courts should decide what treatments are available to minors.
New York Times
18-06-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Supreme Court Upholds Tennessee Ban on Transgender Care for Minors
The Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld a Tennessee law that prohibits some medical treatments for transgender youths, rejecting arguments that it violated the Constitution and shielding similar laws in more than 20 other states. The decision, which came amid the Trump administration's fierce assaults on transgender rights, was a bitter setback for their proponents, who only five years ago celebrated a decision by the court to protect transgender people from workplace discrimination. The vote was 6 to 3, with the court's three liberal members in dissent. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., writing for the majority, acknowledged the 'fierce scientific and policy debates about the safety, efficacy and propriety of medical treatments in an evolving field. The voices in these debates raise sincere concerns; the implications for all are profound.' But he said these questions should be resolved by 'the people, their elected representatives and the democratic process.' The Tennessee law was enacted in 2023, amid a sweeping national pushback to expanding rights for transgender people. Since then, controversies about military service, athletes, bathrooms and pronouns have played a role in President Trump's second-term agenda. The law prohibits medical providers from prescribing puberty-delaying medication, offering hormone therapy or performing surgery to treat the psychological distress caused by incongruence between experienced gender and that assigned at birth. The doctor and three families who sued to challenge the Tennessee law said it discriminated based on both sex and transgender status in violation of the Constitution's equal protection clause. They noted that the law specified that those prohibited treatments were allowed when undertaken for reasons other than gender transition care. In a measure of the shifting politics around transgender issues, the Biden administration intervened on their side. After Mr. Trump took office, his administration issued an executive order directing agencies to take steps to curtail surgeries, hormone therapy and other gender transition care for youths under 19. And in February, his administration formally reversed the government's position in the case and urged the justices to uphold the law. The briefs in the case before the Supreme Court, United States v. Skrmetti, No. 23-477, surveyed the medical evidence, with the challengers stressing that the major American medical associations support the prohibited treatments as crucial for alleviating the psychological distress of many transgender youths. Tennessee's brief countered that scientific uncertainty meant that legislatures rather than courts should decide what treatments are available to minors.
New York Times
12-06-2025
- New York Times
Supreme Court Sides With Teenager in School Disability Discrimination Case
The Supreme Court on Thursday sided with a teenage girl with epilepsy and her parents who had sued a Minnesota school district, claiming that her school had failed to provide reasonable accommodations, which made it difficult for her to receive instruction. The case hinged on what standard of proof was required to show discrimination by public schools in education-related disability lawsuits. In a unanimous decision written by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., the court held that the student and her family needed to show only that the school system had acted with 'deliberate indifference' to her educational needs when they sued. That is the same standard that applies when people sue other institutions for discrimination based on disability. The school district argued that a higher standard — a stringent requirement that the institution had acted with 'bad faith or gross misjudgment' — should apply. Had the district prevailed, the new standard might have applied broadly to all kinds disability rights claims filed under the Rehabilitation Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act. That argument had unnerved some disability rights groups, which had cautioned that a ruling for the school could make it much harder for Americans with disabilities to successfully bring court challenges. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Yahoo
16-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Contributor: How much power to stop the president should federal judges have?
At a time when President Trump is claiming unprecedented executive powers, the Supreme Court may be poised to eliminate a significant check on presidential authority. On Thursday, the court held oral arguments about ending the ability of federal courts to issue nationwide injunctions to halt unconstitutional government actions. It is clear from the arguments that the justices are ideologically divided and the outcome likely will turn on Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., Brett M. Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett, and whether at least two of them will join their three liberal colleagues in preserving the ability of a federal court to issue nationwide injunctions against executive orders. The cases before the court involve the president's blatantly unconstitutional order to eliminate birthright citizenship in the United States. Read more: Justices skeptical of Trump plan to limit birthright citizenship but also injunctions that block it The first sentence of the 14th Amendment declares that 'all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.' This has long been understood to mean that everyone born in this country is a United States citizen regardless of the immigration status of their parents. That was the Supreme Court's holding in 1898, in United States vs. Wong Kim Ark, which clarified what 'subject to the jurisdiction thereof' means. The court ruled that the phrase excluded only 'children born of alien enemies in hostile occupation and children of diplomatic representatives of a foreign state.' Otherwise, if you're born here, you are a citizen. But President Trump's executive order said that after Feb. 19, only those born to parents who are citizens or green card holders could be United States citizens. Lawsuits challenging the order were brought in several federal courts. Each found the executive order unconstitutional and issued a nationwide injunction to keep it from being implemented anywhere in the country. Read more: Contributor: The constitutional crisis is real At the oral arguments Thursday, there was some early discussion about the unconstitutionality of the birthright citizenship executive order. Justice Sonia Sotomayor pointed out that four Supreme Court precedents had resolved that everyone born in the United States was a citizen. But Solicitor General D. John Sauer, representing the Trump administration, was emphatic that the constitutionality of Trump's executive order was not before the court, only the issue of whether a federal district court could enjoin an executive branch order for the entire country. Federal courts have always had this authority, and in recent years it has been used to block policies of Democratic and Republican administrations. Now the Trump administration is urging a radical change, doing away with that authority altogether. At least one of the justices, Clarence Thomas, clearly endorsed that view. He stressed that nationwide injunctions did not begin until the 1960s and are unnecessary. Justices Samuel A. Alito Jr. and Neil M. Gorsuch, who have previously expressed opposition to nationwide injunctions, in their questions also seemed sympathetic to the Trump administration position. Read more: Capitulate or resist? Trump threats spur different responses, and alarm for democracy Consider what an end to nationwide injunctions would mean: A challenge to a government policy would have to be brought separately in each of 94 federal districts and ultimately be heard in every federal circuit court. It would create inconsistent laws — in the case of citizenship, a person born to immigrant parents in one federal district would be a citizen, while one born in identical circumstances in another district would not be — at least until, and unless, the Supreme Court resolved the issue for the entire country. Even Gorsuch expressed concern about the chaos of a patchwork of citizenship rules. The president's primary argument is that nationwide injunctions prevent the executive branch from carrying out its constitutional duties. But as Justice Elena Kagan pointed out, if the president is violating the Constitution, his action should be stopped. The oral arguments left no clear sense of how the court will decide the issue. Read more: Legal experts pan Trump's Supreme Court appeal on birthright citizenship Sotomayor, Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson would without doubt counter Alito, Thomas and Gorsuch. The three most liberal justices would continue to allow nationwide injunctions, and they would also strike down the executive order on birthright citizenship. But the the three more moderate conservatives — Roberts, Kavanaugh and Barrett — did not tip their hand. Some of their questions suggested that they might look for a compromise that would maintain nationwide injunctions but impose new limits on when they can be used. In his first months in office, Trump has issued a flurry of blatantly illegal and unconstitutional executive orders. The federal courts are the only way to check these orders and uphold the rule of law. This is not the time for the Supreme Court to greatly weaken the ability of the federal judiciary to stop illegal presidential acts. Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Berkeley School of Law, is an Opinion Voices contributing writer. If it's in the news right now, the L.A. Times' Opinion section covers it. Sign up for our weekly opinion newsletter. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
