Legal/Law/Criminal Justice and Reform

Texas Becomes Next State To Face Lawsuit Over Child Sex-Change Ban

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Five families, three doctors and two LGBT advocacy organizations filed a lawsuit Thursday against Texas’ law banning child sex-change procedures.

The plaintiffs, backed by the ACLU, filed the lawsuit Thursday to block the law, Senate Bill 14, before it takes effect on Sept. 1. The law, signed by Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott in June, bans sex-change surgeries, puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones for minors, along with the use of state funding for such procedures.

“The Ban violates the right to parental autonomy guaranteed by the Due Course of Law Clause of the Texas Constitution because it prevents Texas parents with transgender children suffering from gender dysphoria from accessing the medically necessary treatment that medical providers have recommended for their children,” the lawsuit states. “The Ban discriminates against parents seeking care for their transgender adolescent children in the exercise of their fundamental right to make decisions concerning the care, custody, and control of their children, by prohibiting them from seeking and following medical advice to protect the health and wellbeing of their children.”

ACLU of Texas staff attorney Brian Klosterboer called the law a “textbook example of discrimination” in a statement.

“Transgender Texans, like all Texans, have the right to get the medical care they need,” said Klosterboer. “The Texas Constitution forbids our state government from overriding the judgment of patients, their families, and their medical providers.”

The plaintiffs are backed by Lambda Legal, the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, the ACLU, the Transgender Law Center, Scott Douglass & McConnico LLP and Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer, LLP.

The ACLU has also filed lawsuits against Tennessee, Alabama, Idaho, Arkansas, Indiana, Oklahoma, Nebraska and Kentucky for similar laws.

Arkansas’ law was struck down by an Obama-appointed federal judge in June. The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals allowed Tennessee’s ban on child sex-change procedures to take effect July 8, pausing a preliminary injunction previously issued by Trump-appointed Judge Eli Richardson while the appeal is pending.

Growing concerns about the safety and effectiveness of child sex change procedures have also caused nearly half of European Union member countries to ban them.