For Immediate Release:
July 25, 2023
For press inquiries only, contact:
Amanda Priest (334) 322-5694
Cameron Mixon (334) 242-7491
(Montgomery) – Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall filed a multistate brief in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in support of Kentucky’s and Tennessee’s bans on experimental and life-altering sex-modification procedures for children. The 21-state brief co-led by Alabama and Arkansas highlights the dishonesty of advocacy groups like the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) that urge courts to defer to them on issues of pediatric sex modification. The brief argues that the Constitution gives states, not WPATH, the authority to protect children from sterilizing medical interventions pushed by radical interest groups.
“In the past, federal courts have erroneously held that states have a constitutional obligation to adhere to WPATH Standards of Care,” said Attorney General Marshall. “Let’s remember these standards say that castration is ‘medically necessary’ for a male who identifies as an ‘eunuch’ and that sterilizing sex-modification treatments for children with gender dysphoria is ‘medically necessary gender-affirming care.’ We hope the Sixth Circuit will soon make it clear that the Constitution puts states and not WPATH in charge of regulating healthcare.”
While healthcare authorities in Europe have recently conducted systematic evidence reviews that led them to sharply curb access to sex-modification procedures for minors, the brief argues that “American medical organizations have run in the opposite direction: advocating unfettered access to transitioning treatments while quashing members’ calls to review the evidence.” The brief continues: “While medical organizations are certainly capable of establishing true, evidence-based standards of care, they have utterly failed to act responsibly when it comes to pediatric sex-modification procedures.” “Until they do so,” the brief concludes, “States like Kentucky and Tennessee are forced to step in to protect children.”
Attorney General Marshall co-led the brief with Arkansas’s Attorney General. The brief was signed by Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, and West Virginia.
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