A federal judge has partially struck down Florida's ban on affirming healthcare for transgender minors in a ruling that condemns anti-trans bigotry and debunks bogus claims from state officials.
The ruling from US District Court Judge Robert Hinkle on 6 June grants a preliminary injunction that blocks enforcement of a law signed by Governor Ron DeSantis and rules that prevent a group of trans youth who sued the state from accessing widely accepted care, including puberty blockers and hormone therapy, as their legal challenge plays out.
A decision from Judge Hinkle, who was appointed by then-President Bill Clinton, follows a lawsuit against the state's surgeon general from a group of Florida families with trans children, who argued that the state could not "demonstrate any rational basis, much less an important or compelling one, for the transgender medical bans which prevent transgender adolescents from getting safe and effective medically necessary healthcare." Judge Hinkle's ruling eviscerates the state's arguments and points to discriminatory language and bigotry that have fuelled Florida's rules as well as similar legislation across the country, condemning the "unspoken suggestion running just below the surface in some of the proceedings that led to adoption of the statute and rules at issue – and just below the surface in the testimony of some of the defense experts – is that transgender identity is not real, that it is made up." |
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