Appeals Court Upholds Indiana Law Banning Gender Transition Procedures for Minors

A federal appeals court on Nov. 13, in a split decision, upheld an Indiana law that bans gender surgeries and other transition procedures for minors.
A U.S. district judge incorrectly found previously that plaintiffs who sued over the law would be irreparably harmed by not being able to access puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones if the law were not blocked, the majority of a U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit panel said.
The law in question, signed in 2023, bars “any medical or surgical service … that seeks to alter or remove physical or anatomical characteristics or features that are typical for the individual’s sex; or instill or create physiological or anatomical characteristics that are different from the individual’s sex.” Exceptions are made for the traditional use of the procedures.
“SEA 480 is a duly enacted law. Indiana’s voters have decided, through their representatives, legislative and executive, that medical interventions are too risky and novel to be safe treatments for children with gender dysphoria. The people of Indiana have a substantial interest in the effectiveness of that decision,” Brennan said. “Because appellees have not shown a likelihood of success, and because their harms are not irreparable, we conclude that the balance of harms favors Indiana.”
The majority also rejected arguments based on the youth’s constitutional rights, including their rights to equal protection. The law “bars gender transition procedures regardless of whether the patient is a boy or a girl: Nobody may receive the treatment the state has chosen to regulate,” Brennan said. “So, sex does not indicate on what basis treatment is prohibited.”
He was joined by U.S. Circuit Judge Kenneth F. Ripple.
“SEA 480’s aiding and abetting provision,” she wrote, “violates the First Amendment because it does not regulate speech integral to unlawful conduct; it does not regulate speech incidental to regulated conduct; and it does not regulate Provider-Plaintiffs’ pure speech in a manner that survives strict scrutiny.”