Transgender Rights Goes to the Supreme Court

Tennessee challenges the Biden administration on ‘gender affirming’ medical treatments for children.

John Amis/AP Images for Human Rights Campaign, file
Transgender rights activists march past the state capitol in Tennessee. John Amis/AP Images for Human Rights Campaign, file

The logic of federalism, and judicial modesty, would seem to bolster the Volunteer State’s position in the transgender rights case to be heard at the Supreme Court next week. The dispute centers on whether Tennessee and 23 other states can ban sex changes and other so-called “gender affirming” medical treatments for children. President Biden filed suit to void such state-imposed bans, pointing to the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection.

Tennessee contends that its law is necessary at a time when “the number of minors receiving gender-dysphoria diagnoses” has “exploded.” The state points to a “corresponding surge in unproven and risky medical interventions for these underage patients.” The state banned some of these treatments — “puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and sex-transition surgeries” — pointing to their “serious and potentially irreversible side effects.”

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