JUST IN: Supreme Court to hear challenge to child sex change bans

On Monday, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the Biden administration’s challenge of a Tennessee law banning puberty blockers and sex change surgeries for minors. The decision in the case, expected in the court’s 2024 term that spans from October 2024 to September 2025, could affect around 20 states that have similar laws in place. 

In United States v Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti, the Department of Justice seeks the Supreme Court to answer whether Tennessee’s SB 1 "violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment." The appeal comes after a federal appeals court upheld Tennessee’s ban.

Solicitor General Elizabeth B. Prelogar said in the government’s petition to the court that "the law leaves the same treatments entirely unrestricted if they are prescribed for any other purpose." 

She argued that the law could allow "a teenager whose sex assigned at birth is male can be prescribed testosterone to conform to a male gender identity, but a teenager assigned female at birth cannot." 

In a statement after the court took up the case, Skrmetti wrote, "We fought hard to defend Tennessee's law protecting kids from irreversible gender treatments and secured a thoughtful and well-reasoned opinion from the Sixth Circuit. I look forward to finishing the fight in the United States Supreme Court. This case will bring much-needed clarity to whether the Constitution contains special protections for gender identity."

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