Judge Blocks Biden Admin Rule Republican AGs Warned Would Force Health Care Providers To Accept Radical Gender Ideology

 A federal judge in Mississippi blocked a proposed rule from the Department of Health and Human Services this week, siding with a group of Republican attorneys general who warned the rule from the Biden administration would force health care providers to accept radical gender ideology.

On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Louis Guirola Jr. ruled that HHS expanded its statutory authority when it proposed a rule to expand prohibitions against sex discrimination to include sexual orientation and gender identity. Republican officials, led by Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti, said that the rule would force states to pay for transgender surgeries on children.

“Today a federal court said no to the Biden administration’s attempt to illegally force every health care provider in America to adopt the most extreme version of gender ideology,” Skrmetti said. “The administration has over and over again issued regulations that mangle the law to advance an ideological agenda.”

“This case is just one of many examples of Tennessee working with other states to block the unlawful abuse of regulatory power,” Skrmetti added. “Today’s order puts the rule on pause while we keep fighting to ensure this illegal rule never goes into effect.”

In his decision, Guirola wrote that he was blocking the rule “so far as this final rule is intended to extend discrimination on the basis of sex to include discrimination on the basis of gender identity.”

“The Court finds that Plaintiffs have demonstrated that there is a substantial likelihood of success on the merits of their claims and that they will suffer irreparable harm in the form of either compliance costs or lost federal funding,” the judge wrote. “The substantial cost of compliance with the 181-page rule weighs in favor of maintaining the status quo. Therefore, Plaintiffs have demonstrated that they are entitled to a nationwide preliminary injunction prohibiting Defendants from enforcing HHS’s May 2024 Rule.”

 

Other states that sued included Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Virginia, and West Virginia.

Their complaint against HHS said that the rule would make the states “use taxpayer funds to pay for unproven and costly gender-transition interventions through Medicaid and state health plans — even for children who may suffer irreversible harms.”

The rule had been set to go into effect on July 5.