The Biden administration now claims to oppose transgender surgeries for minors days after documents uncovered in an ongoing Alabama lawsuit exposed one cabinet member for lobbying a transgender health group to remove minimum age requirements for surgeries.
According to a report by the New York Times on Friday night, a Biden administration official told the outlet they now opposed “gender-affirming surgery for minors.” They expressed opposition only to surgeries for minors, not other treatments, according to the outlet.
1819 News reported recently on newly unsealed documents in a lawsuit against Alabama's transgender surgery ban for minors revealed the Biden administration lobbied against including minimum age requirements in the WPATH standards of care for surgeries.
One of those documents showed internal communications of unnamed WPATH members developing standard of care guidelines discussing lobbying efforts in 2022 from Biden administration officials such as transgender Admiral Rachel Levine, who serves as the 17th Assistant Secretary for Health for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in Biden's cabinet.
“The issue of ages and treatment has been quite controversial (mainly for surgery) and it has come up again. We sent the document to Admiral Levine…She likes the SOC-8 very much but she was very concerned that having ages (mainly for surgery) will affect access to health care for trans youth and maybe adults too,” one WPATH member wrote. “Apparently, the situation in the USA is terrible, and she and the Biden administration worried that having ages in the document will make matters worse. She asked us to remove them. We have the WPATH executive committee in this meeting and we explained to her that we could not just remove them.”
WPATH guidance originally recommended age minimums of 14 for hormone treatment, 15 for mastectomies, 16 for breast augmentation, and 17 for genital surgeries. However, later guidance from the group included no age minimums.
Litigation challenging Alabama's VCAP law is ongoing.
To connect with the author of this story or to comment, email caleb.taylor@1819News.com.
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