Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch and TennesseeAttorney General Jonathan Skrmetti announced a multi-state lawsuitchallenging a new rule recently promulgated by the U.S. Department of Healthand Human Services (HHS) that redefines the Affordable Care Act’sprohibition against discrimination on the basis of “sex” to include “genderidentity.”.
Under threat of severe penalties, the rule would require medicalproviders to perform surgeries and administer hormone drugs to both childrenand adults for the purpose of gender transition, without regard for a doctor’smedical judgment as to whether that treatment was appropriate.
The new rule would further require medical providers to allow patients intosex-segregated spaces, such as parts of a hospital reserved only for womenpatients, on the basis of their gender identity rather than their biological sex.And it would require every health care worker to use gender-affirmingpronouns and punish providers for the use of biologically-accurate pronouns.In 2016, the Obama Administration promulgated a near-identical policypreferencing gender ideology over medical reality, even where medicalproviders believed gender-transition treatments or other procedures were notin the best interests of their patients. Federal courts struck down that 2016 ruleas unlawful, and the States bringing this lawsuit expect the same result here.“Injecting gender identity into our state’s medical system is a dangerouspursuit of a political agenda from the Biden Administration. Under this newrule, doctors and medical providers are forced to perform surgeries andprovide gender transition care, ignoring medical judgment completely,” saidAttorney General Lynn Fitch.“I am proud to stand with TennesseeAttorney General Jonathan Skrmetti in pushing back on this reckless rule.”
The Biden Administration’s rule could have significant impacts on Mississippiand other states that restrict the provision of gender-transition interventions tominors and decline to use public funds to pay for these procedures. Coveredentities found non-compliant with this new HHS rule risk the loss of significantfederal funding—including the loss of billions of dollars in state Medicaidfunding designed to assist low-income individuals—and exposure to civilliability through private lawsuits.Mississippi enacted The REAP (Regulate Experimental Adolescent Procedures)Act, which prohibits a person from knowingly providing gender transitionprocedures to any person under 18 years of age and prohibits a person fromaiding or abetting the performance or inducement of gender transitionprocedures to any person under 18.
The bill also prohibits the use of publicfunds or tax deductions for gender transition procedures.Mississippi and Tennessee are joined in the lawsuit by the states of Alabama,Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma,South Carolina, South Dakota, Virginia, and West Virginia.
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