On Wednesday, members of the Supreme Court’s conservative majority appeared ready to uphold a Tennessee law denying puberty-delaying medication, hormone therapy, or gender-affirming surgery to transgender youth, a decision that will hold precedent in more than 20 other states with similar laws.
The argument touched on parental rights, a precedent protecting transgender people from workplace discrimination, and, critically, whether the law discriminated on the basis of sex, which would entitle it to a stricter standard of judicial scrutiny.
The justices seemed poised to strike down the sex-based discrimination argument and rule that because scientific evidence about the safety of transitionary care for minors is contested, the question should be decided by legislatures, not judges. Such a decision would leave these issues to the states to decide. The court isn’t expected to rule until June, but it comes at a time when transgender issues are at the center of America’s culture wars.
