Idaho Backs Gender-Affirming Care Ban in Constitutional Conflict
- Barred care provides no proven benefits, state attorney says
- Three states given power to enforce bans, more suits pending
An Idaho law that prohibits doctors from using puberty-blocking drugs and cross-sex hormones to treat gender dysphoria in minors should take effect as planned Jan. 1, the state says, because it protects youths against unproven therapies and significant risks of lifelong, irreversible harm.
Attorney General Raúl Labrador (R) asked the US District Court for the District of Idaho to deny a preliminary injunction and dismiss a a lawsuit that seeks to prohibit the state from enforcing its gender-affirming care ban for minors. The treatments barred by Idaho’s Vulnerable Child Protection Act “provide no proven benefits,” Labrador
said in Monday’s filing.
Idaho is one of 22 states that ban some form of gender-affirming care for minors. So far, the Sixth and Eleventh circuits have allowed bans to take effect in Alabama, Kentucky, and Tennessee, and the Seventh and Eighth circuits have been asked to weigh in on Indiana and Arkansas laws that bar the treatments.
This case potentially puts the question of whether the bans violate the 14th Amendment’s equal protection and due process clauses before yet another federal appeals court—the Ninth Circuit. That court recently
upheld a ruling that blocked implementation of Idaho’s ban on transgender women and girls participating in school sports.
Labrador emphasized that Idaho law permits mental-health therapy to treat a condition in which transgender people suffer severe distress due to the mismatch between the sex they were assigned at birth and their gender identity. He also clarified that the law doesn’t apply to adults.
But there’s no proof of the long-term effects drug and hormone therapy might have on young people, and there’s “
total uncertainty” over the potential side-effects of suppressing puberty in healthy adolescents, Labrador said.
The Idaho law is constitutional as to the minors, Labrador said. It isn’t subject to heightened scrutiny “merely because it acknowledges biological differences that must be considered in the medical context,” he said. Additionally, the law would survive even if reviewed under this higher standard because it serves a compelling state interest in protecting minors from harmful and unproven health care, he said.
The parents can’t succeed on their parental rights claim, Labrador also said. They don’t have a substantive due process right to allow their children to access unproven treatments because such a right isn’t deeply rooted in the nation’s history, he said.
Cooper & Kirk PLLC and Labrador’s office represent the state. Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP; Groombridge, Wu, Baughman & Stone LLP; Wrest Collective; the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation; and the ACLU of Idaho represent the plaintiffs.
The case is
Poe v. Labrador, D. Idaho, No. 23-cv-269, brief opposing preliminary injunction filed 10/2/23.