The Supreme Court appears poised to uphold Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for transgender youth after it heard arguments Wednesday in United States v. Skrmetti. The Biden administration and the American Civil Liberties Union argued that the law, which bans hormone therapy for transgender children but not cisgender children, is a form of sex discrimination, but right-wing justices who make up the court’s majority appeared to reject that argument. ACLU lawyer Chase Strangio, who has now become the first openly transgender lawyer to argue before the Supreme Court, describes the stakes and analyzes the reactions of the justices during the landmark case, which is expected to be decided next year. “It is precisely the role of the courts to step in when the government infringes on the individual constitutional rights of minority groups,” says Strangio. “People are suffering. They just want to be able to live their lives, and this law takes those opportunities away from them.”
