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The Justice Department filed a complaint Friday, challenging Alabama’s Senate Bill (SB) 184, which bans transgender treatment for children.
The Ministry of Justice claims that criminalizing the sexual transition of children is a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment on the basis of equal protection.
Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey signed a law this month banning drugs that block puberty for minors. The bill commits a crime punishable by up to 10 years in prison, prescribing pubertal blockers or hormones to transgender children to help with gender reassignment.
SB 184 makes it a crime for any person to “engage or cause” certain types of medical care for transgender minors. In this way, SB 184 discriminates against transgender young people by denying them access to certain forms of medically necessary care, “the Ministry of Justice wrote. “It further discriminates against transgender young people by denying them access to certain procedures, while allowing non-transgender minors to have access to the same or similar procedures.”
ALABAMA GOVERNOR SIGNS LAW PROHIBITING PUBERTY BLOCKERS, SEXUAL TRANSITION OPERATIONS
FILE: Alabama Gov. Kay Ivy in Woodstock, Alabama, March 15, 2022 (REUTERS / Elijah Nouvelage)
“Today’s submission is the latest action by the Ministry of Justice to combat discrimination based on gender identity, including illegal restrictions on medical care for transgender youth,” the ministry continued. “On March 31, 2022, the Civil Rights Department issued a letter to all public prosecutors reminding them of the federal constitutional and legal provisions that protect transgender youth from discrimination.
Ivy signed legislation to block puberty a day after state deputies passed the bill. Groups immediately vowed to challenge the law in court.
Alabama is the second state to impose a ban on caring for sex-oriented minors and the first to impose criminal penalties. A similar measure in Arkansas that would ban doctors from prescribing drugs has been blocked by a federal judge.
Ivy also signed legislation banning some teachers at an Alabama elementary school from discussing issues related to gender identity and sexual orientation in school.
The Justice Department building is visible in Washington. (Reuters)
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The parents of two Alabama children who identify as transgender joined two doctors in the trial of Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey and other government officials in a bid to block the state’s new law banning cross-sex hormones and so-called “puberty-blocking” drugs for minors. .
Parents and doctors – represented by a number of left-wing law firms, including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the Southern Legal Center for Poverty (SPLC) and the Human Rights Campaign, among others – say SB 184which Ivy signed on Friday violates federal non-discrimination law, including a provision of the Affordable Care Act, also known as ObamaCare.
Stephen Soras of Fox News contributed to this report.
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