Attorney General Steve Marshall recently filed a brief with the U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) in defense of a Tennessee law banning transgender surgeries and medications for minors.
The Tennessee law currently restricts puberty blockers and hormone therapy for transgender minors. The Biden administration joined the suit against Tennessee, along with multiple other plaintiffs. Alabama passed a virtually identical law in 2022, which has also been challenged in federal court.
In June, SCOTUS announced it would take up the Tennessee case after appeals reached the nation's highest court. The case will have a massive impact on other Southern states, like Alabama, which have enacted similar bans. Of the over 20 states that have passed some ban or restriction on so-called gender-affirming care for minors, all are currently involved in litigation. The Tennessee case is the first such law to be taken up by SCOTUS.
"When the Biden-Harris administration sued Alabama and demanded that the state allow sex-change procedures on children, we fought back," Marshall said. "Through court-ordered discovery, Alabama exposed a truly shocking medical, legal, and political scandal. Internal documents from the federal government and radical advocacy groups showed that the Biden-Harris administration, 'social justice lawyers,' and self-appointed medical 'experts' manipulated medical guidelines for the purpose of convincing courts to abolish age limits for sterilizing chemical treatments and surgeries for kids. It is no wonder the Department of Justice fought so hard to shut down discovery in Alabama's case. The administration secretly helped craft these purportedly 'evidence-based' guidelines and knew there was precious little evidence behind them, but still told courts to defer to them. We ask the Supreme Court to reject the administration's cynical argument that the Constitution now mandates States like Alabama and Tennessee use those guidelines to harm children."
Newly unsealed documents in a lawsuit against Alabama's ban revealed the Biden administration lobbied against including minimum age requirements in the World Professional Association for Transgender Health's (WPATH) standards of care for surgeries.
Marshall's brief heavily emphasizes WPATH and its collusion with the Biden administration's Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to promote irreversible, non-evidence-based interventions.
The full brief can be found below.
"The new evidence suggests clear reasons for why the United States acted as it did — and why it continues to oppose unsealing other evidence Alabama received," the brief reads. "Discovery uncovered that not only does the WPATH emperor have no clothes but that senior HHS officials and 'social justice lawyers' acted as the organization's tailor."
It continues, "Yet the United States and WPATH press on, pretending the science is settled, the debate over. They assure anxious parents that sex-change procedures are the only way to help their 13-year-old daughter feeling uncomfortable in her body, and they pose impossible questions to kids who must decide whether to alter their bodies and risk their future fertility by treating their psychological ailments with hormones and surgeries—all before they are old enough to vote. Thankfully, the Tennessee Legislature acted. Kids suffering from gender dysphoria deserve better. In areas like this, 'legislative options must be especially broad and courts should be cautious not to rewrite legislation.' The Constitution does not mandate that States bow to the dictates of radical interest groups like WPATH."
To connect with the author of this story or to comment, email craig.monger@1819news.com.
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