Supreme Court signals intent to uphold Tennessee ban on trans surgeries for minors, defer to states

The Supreme Court’s conservative justices displayed deep skepticism towards pleas to quash a Tennessee ban on transgender surgeries for minors, with several moderates on the bench seemingly hinting at an inclination toward state deference during oral arguments.Appearing to largely splinter along ideological grounds over Tennessee’s sweeping ban against performing operations on minors to alter their sex in the case United States v.

Skrmetti, potential swing members sounded wary of scuttling the law.“We may think that we can do just as good a job with respect to the evidence here as Tennessee or anybody else but my understanding is that the Constitution leaves that question to the people’s representatives,” Chief Justice John Roberts contended at one point.

“It seems to me that is something where we are extraordinarily bereft of expertise.”Wednesday marked the first time an openly transgender attorney — Chase Strangio, the deputy director for transgender justice at the American Civil Liberties Union — delivered arguments before the high court.Strangio represented respondents that buttressed the Biden administration’s petition against the ban, which was argued by US Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar.

During oral arguments, Roberts introduced to the attorney as “Mr.Strangio,” drawing blowback from some conservatives on social media for acknowledging the gender with which the attorney identifies.

The Supreme Court also utilized Strangio’s preferred pronouns on its docket sheet.“The underlying science and the evidence showed that Tennessee’s assertion of harm and their prevalence were not supported.

The district court made factual findings to that effect, of which Tennessee has not argued were clearly erroneous,” Strangio argued in response to Roberts’ point, referring to a lower-court finding.“Here what they’ve done is impose a blunderbuss ban overriding the very careful judgment of parents who love and care for their child...