Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison has joined a federal lawsuit that seeks to stop an executive order signed by President Donald Trump which protects children from the surgical and chemical mutilations that many Democrats refer to as “gender-affirming care.”
On Jan. 28, President Trump signed an executive order which mandates that the United States will not “fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support the so-called ‘transition’ of a child from one sex to another, and it will rigorously enforce all laws that prohibit or limit these destructive and life-altering procedures.”
In accordance with that order, federal agencies that disperse research and educational grants were instructed to ensure that hospitals and medical schools receiving those grants end any programs they operate which involve transgender procedures for children.
Additionally, the executive order directs the Department of Justice (DOJ) to take action against those who are misleading the public about the long-term effects of transgender procedures, and requires the DOJ to prioritize investigations against “so-called sanctuary States that facilitate stripping custody from parents who support the healthy development of their own children.”
Trump’s executive order notes that “Across the country today, medical professionals are maiming and sterilizing a growing number of impressionable children under the radical and false claim that adults can change a child’s sex through a series of irreversible medical interventions. This dangerous trend will be a stain on our Nation’s history, and it must end.”
In response to the executive action, Ellison joined the attorneys general of Washington and Oregon in filing a federal lawsuit that seeks to stop Trump’s order.
“Our children deserve so much better than to be targeted, intimidated, and denied medically necessary healthcare by the President of the United States and his billionaire cronies,” said Ellison. “Gender-affirming care is evidence based, provided by licensed and trained medical professionals, and provided with the consent of a young person’s parents or legal guardians.”
In their lawsuit, the trio of attorneys general argue that congressionally authorized funding cannot be conditioned upon Trump’s order, the states have the right to establish their own medical standards of care, and the executive order illegally singles out transgender people for discrimination and mistreatment.
The legal filing says Trump’s order “appears to serve no interest at all save to communicate official, presidentially directed animus against transgender and gender-diverse people, their medical providers, and their families.” The attorneys general also expressed their distaste for the executive order’s language, which referred to transgender procedures as “chemical and surgical mutilation.”
“I will not stand by and let Donald Trump weaponize the federal government against young people just trying to be themselves and against doctors providing the best care they can to their patients,” added Ellison.
The federal lawsuit was filed in the Western District of Washington.
Since taking office, Trump has issued executive orders to stop illegal immigration, deport illegal aliens, secure America’s southern border, improve government efficiency, expand American energy production, prevent men from competing in women’s sports, and many others.
However, some of those orders have since been temporarily halted by federal judges after lawsuits were filed designed to prevent those orders from being implemented.
Luke Sprinkel
Luke Sprinkel previously worked as a Legislative Assistant at the Minnesota House of Representatives. He grew up as a Missionary Kid (MK) living in England, Thailand, Tanzania, and the Middle East. Luke graduated from Regent University in 2018.
