Judge affirms Missouri ban on transgender surgeries for minors

A Missouri judge found that a state ban on transgender surgeries and hormone treatments for minors was constitutional Monday, just over a week before the US Supreme Court took up a very similar case out of Tennessee.Judge Robert Craig Carter highlighted the murky ethics behind the controversial treatments for gender dysphoria in his ruling on challenges from LGBTQ civil rights activists against the Save Adolescents From Experimentation Act, which was signed into law last year.“The evidence from trial showed that the medical ethics of gender dysphoria treatment for children and adolescents are entirely unsettled,” Carter, who sits on the 44th Judicial Circuit Court of Missouri, wrote in a lengthy 72-page ruling.“Any person — including a minor — would be able to obtain anything from meth, to ecstasy to abortion so long as a single medical professional were willing to recommend it,” he later cautioned.Missouri Gov. Mike Parson (R) signed the law last year, and it went into effect in August 2023.It also enacted a three-year ban on puberty blockers and hormone therapy for minors unless they were in the middle of such treatment.

The measure slapped penalties on physicians who flout the law, including possible revocation of their medical license and the ability for patients to sue for at least 15 years with a minimum of $500,000 in damages for a successful suit.Carter also pointed to a 2007 Supreme Court ruling that concluded options for state legislatures must “be epically broad” in instances that are “fraught with medical and scientific uncertainties.” Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey (R) quickly took a victory lap over the ruling.

“The Court has left Missouri’s law banning child mutilation in place, a resounding victory for our children.We are the first state in the nation to successfully defend such a law at the trial court level,” Bailey said in a statement. “I’m extremely proud of the thousands of hours my office put in to...