Federal judge strikes down Florida's transgender care restrictions for minors and adults
A Florida law restricting transition-related care for minors is unconstitutional, a judge ruled, and was also motivated by anti-transgender bias.
A federal judge on Tuesday struck down parts of Florida’s restrictions on transition-related medical care for transgender minors and adults, declaring several statutes that ban such care unconstitutional.
The law, championed by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, made Florida among the most restrictive states for transgender care in the nation.
“Transgender opponents are of course free to hold their beliefs,” Judge Robert L. Hinkle of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida, Tallahassee Division, wrote in his opinion. “But they are not free to discriminate against transgender individuals just for being transgender. In time, discrimination against transgender individuals will diminish, just as racism and misogyny have diminished. To paraphrase a civil-rights advocate from an earlier time, the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”
Hinkle added, “The State of Florida can regulate as needed but cannot flatly deny transgender individuals safe and effective medical treatment — treatment with medications routinely provided to others with the state’s full approval so long as the purpose is not to support the patient’s transgender identity.”
Hinkle’s ruling strikes down administrative rules of a law enacted in May 2023 that banned puberty blockers and hormone therapy for trans minors and placed restrictions on how all trans people, including adults, can receive care. The law required that trans people seek hormone therapy from a physician rather than another licensed health care provider and that the trans patient provide in-person written consent, making it illegal to receive such care via telehealth.
Rating: 5