Biden-judicial appointee strikes down RFK Jr's declaration against child sex changes

A federal judge in Oregon has ruled against Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr’s December declaration that providers who offer sex change treatments for minors "do not meet professionally recognized standards," saying that the secretary overstepped his legal authority.

The December declaration from Kennedy stated, "Sex-rejecting procedures for children and adolescents are neither safe nor effective as a treatment modality for gender dysphoria, gender incongruence, or other related disorders in minors, and therefore, fail to meet professional recognized standards of health care." He also warned that providers could be excluded from federal health programs such as Medicare and Medicaid if they provided such services.

21 Democrat-led states sued Kennedy and DHHS over the declaration, claiming that it interfered with states’ power to regulate medical practices within their borders, and that the declaration was an attempt to establish a national medical standard unilaterally, violating the Administrative Procedure Act, per the New York Times. The Trump administration argued that the states had failed to show harm, because providers of sex change treatments have not been barred from receiving Medicare and Medicaid at this point.

In a six-hour hearing on Thursday, the federal government argued that the declaration from Kennedy was just him expressing his opinion. Kathryn Alkire with the Justice Department said, "This is his opinion after reviewing the medical research cited within, and the opinion he has formed is that certain types of treatments do not meet professionally recognized standards of care and are not supported by the greater weight of the evidence. This is an important issue to Secretary Kennedy," per Courthouse News Service.

US District Judge Mustafa Kasubhai, a Biden-appointed Judge, sided with the states on the matter, vacating the declaration from the bench. "It’s not merely an opinion; it has materially modified not even how the standards of care might be applied in gender-affirming care, but there is no standard of care that can be applied," he said.

He later added, "The declaration provides some very explicit, unequivocal statements about what falls below the professionally recognized standard of care as it relates to gender-affirming care. It is unambiguous, it does not provide for options or alternatives, it is clear that gender-affirming care does not fall within that which is professionally recognized as standards of care."

He claimed that the case reflected a broader trend in challenges against the administration. "There’s a theme of ‘Break it and see what others will do,’ and that’s not a system or method committed to the rule of law. That notion that ‘I will go forward, issue a declaration and see if we can get away with it,’ that is not a principle of governance that adheres to the overarching commitment to the democratic public that requires the rule of law to be regarded and respected and honored as sacred."

The plaintiff states that sued included California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, as well as the District of Columbia.