Alabama lawmakers, who approved the bill this spring, said decisions on the medications should wait until adulthood.
that made it a felony to prescribe gender-affirming puberty blockers and hormones to transgender minors.
The Vulnerable Child Compassion and Protection Act made it a felony, punishable by up to 10 years in prison, to prescribe or administer gender-affirming medication to transgender minors to help affirm their new gender identity. The judge left in place another part of the law that banned gender-affirming surgeries for transgender minors, which doctors had testified are not done on minors in Alabama.
Four families with transgender children ranging in ages 12 to 17, had filed a lawsuit challenging the Alabama law as discriminatory, an unconstitutional violation of equal protection and free speech rights and an intrusion into family medical decisions. The U.S. Department of Justice joined the lawsuit seeking to overturn the law.
“Enjoining the Act upholds and reaffirms the ‘enduring American tradition’ that parents — not the states or federal courts — play the primary role in nurturing and caring for their children,” Burke wrote in the opinion.