A coalition of Democratic-led states and the District of Columbia has filed a federal lawsuit seeking to block new health policy changes proposed by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The proposed changes would restrict hospitals from receiving Medicare and Medicaid funding if they perform gender transition procedures on minors.
New York Attorney General Letitia James announced Tuesday that she is spearheading the legal challenge on behalf of 19 states and Washington, D.C., targeting senior officials at U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
“[HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.] cannot unilaterally change medical standards by posting a document online, and no one should lose access to medically necessary health care because their federal government tried to interfere in decisions that belong in doctors’ offices,” James said in a statement.
“At the core of this so-called declaration are real people: young people who need care, parents trying to support their children, and doctors who are simply following the best medical evidence available.”
The lawsuit follows last week’s announcement by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who unveiled proposed regulations that would disqualify any hospital or medical facility from Medicare and Medicaid participation if it provides sex-change surgeries or hormonal treatments to children diagnosed with gender dysphoria.
Kennedy signed a formal declaration asserting that “sex-rejecting treatments on children do not meet professionally recognized standards of health care,” outlining the administration’s rationale for the policy shift.
Under the declaration, “sex-rejecting procedures” are defined as “pharmaceutical or surgical interventions, including puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries such as mastectomies, vaginoplasties, and other procedures, that attempt to align an individual’s physical appearance or body with an asserted identity that differs from the individual’s sex.”
HHS officials argue that these interventions, which may involve removing healthy organs or suppressing natural puberty, place minors at risk of “irreversible damage, including infertility, impaired sexual function, diminished bone density, altered brain development, and other irreversible physiological effects.”
The regulatory move came shortly before the U.S. House of Representatives passed legislation barring gender transition procedures for minors, a bill that faces steep obstacles in the narrowly divided Senate.
To date, 27 states have adopted laws or policies limiting or banning some form of medical gender transition for children, citing concerns about long-term safety and outcomes.
Filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon, Eugene Division, the lawsuit contends that HHS introduced the proposed rules abruptly and without proper authority, alleging that the agency violated federal law.
The complaint argues that the new regulations were issued “without warning,” that they “exceed the Secretary’s authority,” and that they “violate the Administrative Procedure Act and the Medicare and Medicaid statutes.”
“At minimum, Secretary Kennedy and HHS cannot circumvent statutorily mandated notice and comment requirements by changing substantive legal standards by executive fiat,” the states asserted in their filing.
Kennedy, defending the policy at a press conference last week, said, “So-called 'gender-affirming care' has inflicted lasting physical and psychological damage on vulnerable young people. This is not medicine; it is malpractice.”
“Sex-rejecting procedures are neither safe nor effective treatment for children with gender dysphoria,” he added.
