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Supreme Court Green-Lights Idaho Law Banning Trans Drugs on Children

  • Michael Foust CrosswalkHeadlines Contributor
  • Updated Apr 16, 2024
Supreme Court Green-Lights Idaho Law Banning Trans Drugs on Children

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday waded into the debate over transgenderism and minors when it greenlit an Idaho law that prohibits children from receiving puberty blockers, cross-sex hormone drugs and sex-change surgeries.

That law, the Vulnerable Child Protection Act, was signed by the governor in 2023 but blocked by a lower court. An appeals court then affirmed the lower court.

But the Supreme Court, in a 6-3 decision Monday, lifted the lower court’s injunction and ruled that Idaho can enforce the law, except against the families who filed the lawsuit. (Idaho did not ask the court to lift the injunction against the families.)

It is at least the third major win for supporters of such laws nationwide, and by far the biggest victory yet. Last year, the Eleventh Circuit and the Sixth Circuit allowed similar laws in Alabama and Tennessee, respectively, to go into effect.

For minors, the law prohibits: 1) “puberty-blocking medication to stop or delay normal puberty,” 2) “doses of testosterone to a female,” 3) “doses of estrogen to a male,” 4) mastectomies, and, 5) “surgeries that sterilize or mutilate, or artificially construct tissue with the appearance of genitalia that differs from the child’s biological sex.”

The court’s liberal bloc -- Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor -- dissented from the ruling. Voting to lift the injunction were members of the court’s conservative bloc: John Roberts, Brett Kavanaugh, Amy Coney Barrett, Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch.

The court’s ruling allows Idaho to enforce the new law while the lawsuit proceeds at the lower court.

Idaho Attorney General Raúl R. Labrador applauded the court’s action.

“This is a BIG win to protect vulnerable kids!” Labrador said.

The law “protects children from harmful and experimental drugs,” he said.

“I’m proud to defend Idaho’s law that ensures children are not subjected to these dangerous drugs and procedures,” Labrador said.

Alliance Defending Freedom is assisting Idaho in defending the law.

Gorsuch issued a concurring opinion that Thomas and Alito joined. He criticized the lower court for blocking the law statewide.

“Among other things, this meant Idaho could not enforce its prohibition against surgeries to remove or alter children’s genitals, even though no party before the court had sought access to those surgeries or demonstrated that Idaho’s prohibition of them offended federal law,” Gorsuch wrote. “The court’s order promised to suspend Idaho’s law indefinitely, too, as this litigation (like many today) may take years to reach final judgment.”

Kavanaugh responded to arguments by Jackson and Sotomayor who said the court should have stayed out of the case.

“This Court is responsible for resolving questions of national importance, even when they arise on the emergency docket,” Kavanaugh wrote in a concurring opinion joined by Barrett.

Image credit: Adam Szuscik/Unsplash

Michael Foust has covered the intersection of faith and news for 20 years. His stories have appeared in Baptist Press, Christianity Today, The Christian Post, the Leaf-Chronicle, the Toronto Star and the Knoxville News-Sentinel.