The state of Arkansas won a court victory to reinstate a ban on transgender medical interventions for minors that was passed in 2021.
The Eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis ruled 8-2 to overturn a lower court ruling and said the ban was not unconstitutional. The court cited a Supreme Court ruling that upheld a similar ban in Tennessee.
‘This is not medicine; this affirmation is not science. We are mutilating kids.’
However, the appeals ruling went further than the Supreme Court decision and said that the transgender ban did not violate the parents’ 14th Amendment rights to due process.
“This court finds no such right in this Nation’s history and tradition,” wrote U.S. Circuit Judge Duane Benton in reference to the contested parental right to procure transgender medical treatment for children.
U.S. Circuit Judge Jane Kelly wrote in her dissent that there was a “startling lack of evidence connecting Arkansas’ ban on gender-affirming care with its purported goal of protecting children.”
“I can’t tell you how many times over the last four years people have asked me, ‘When is this gonna happen? We’ve got to stop this castration, chemically, surgically, of children.’ They need to be protected. And we’ve waited patiently, and today’s a good day,” said state Rep. Robin Lundstrum, a Republican who sponsored the bill.
The Arkansas legislature voted to override a veto from then-Gov. Asa Hutchinson, who is also a Republican, in order to pass the ban. The law was the first of its kind, but many other states have since passed similar bans on transgender medical interventions.
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ACLU executive director Holly Dickson released a statement excoriating the ruling.
“This is a tragically unjust result for transgender Arkansans, their doctors, and their families,” Dickson said.
“The state had every opportunity and failed at every turn to prove that this law helps children; in fact, this is a dangerous law that harms children,” she added. “The law has already had a profound impact on families across Arkansas who all deserve a fundamental right to do what is best for their children.”
State Sen. Alan Clark (R) disagreed.
“This is not medicine; this affirmation is not science. We are mutilating kids,” he said.
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