The Texas Supreme Court docket has upheld a ban on little one intercourse modifications, ruling that such a coverage doesn’t violate the state’s structure.
Justices voted by a majority of eight to one in favor of permitting the regulation, which was handed by Texas legislators final yr, to stay in place.
Beneath the laws, medical doctors are prohibited from prescribing hormones and puberty blockers, and it additionally prevents them them from performing intercourse change procedures on minors.
“The legislature made a permissible, rational coverage option to restrict the kinds of out there medical procedures for youngsters, notably in mild of the relative nascency of each gender dysphoria and its varied modes of therapy and the legislature’s specific constitutional authority to control the apply of drugs,” Texas Supreme Court docket Justice Rebecca Huddle wrote.
BREAKING: Texas Supreme Court docket upholds Texas ban on s*x-change surgical procedures for minors.
Enormous W! pic.twitter.com/tYg5JzBt5M
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) June 28, 2024
“We due to this fact conclude the statute doesn’t unconstitutionally deprive dad and mom of their rights or physicians or well being,” she continued.
Justice Debra Lehrmann, the one choose who opposed the ruling, wrote in her dissent that the regulation was “merciless” and “unconstitutional” and went towards previous efforts by the courtroom to create a “a strong conceptualization of parental autonomy.”
“This specific parental proper — to make doubtlessly lifesaving medical choices for one’s youngsters — definitely doesn’t fall throughout the similar class as tattooing, tobacco use and even little one labor,” she wrote.
Texas Legal professional Normal Ken Paxton celebrated the ruling, saying in an announcement that the courtroom had succeeded in “defending youngsters from harmful gender confusion procedures by prohibiting puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and mutilative surgical procedures on minors.”
“We’ll all the time defend youngsters in Texas from these irreversible procedures,” he added.
At this time, the Texas Supreme Court docket upheld SB 14, a regulation defending youngsters from harmful gender confusion procedures by prohibiting puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and mutilative surgical procedures on minors. We’ll all the time defend youngsters in Texas from these irreversible procedures.…
— Legal professional Normal Ken Paxton (@KenPaxtonTX) June 28, 2024
Over a dozen Republican managed states together with Arizona, Florida and Georgia have banned little one intercourse modifications over the previous few years, as legislators search to guard youngsters from irreversible choices and potential medical harms.