A judge has blocked two executive orders by President Donald Trump that banned the federal funding of trans surgeries and chemical castrations of youth exhibiting confusion about their sex.
United States District Judge Lauren King of the Western District of Washington at Seattle, a Biden appointee, issued an order last Friday granting a preliminary injunction against the orders.
King argued that Trump’s executive orders violated “the separation of powers” by assuming Congress’ role to “appropriate federal funds and set conditions on their use.”
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King also argued that the executive orders go against the “Fifth Amendment’s equal protection guarantee,” claiming it “prohibits the federal government from treating people differently based on sex or transgender status unless the government can establish an ‘exceedingly persuasive justification’ for doing so and a ‘close means-end fit.’”
“The [c]ourt’s holding here is not about the policy goals that President Trump seeks to advance; rather, it is about reaffirming the structural integrity of the Constitution by ensuring that executive action respects congressional authority,” King wrote.
Washington state Attorney General Nick Brown, who is helping to challenge the executive orders, released a statement last Friday celebrating the preliminary injunction.
“The president’s disregard for the Constitution is obvious and intentional,” Brown argued. “But once again, states and the courts have stepped up to affirm the rule of law and the values that hold us together as a nation.”
In January, Trump issued Executive Order 14168, also known as “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.”
EO 14168 defined the word “sex” as “an individual’s immutable biological classification as either male or female,” adding that it was “not a synonym for and does not include the concept of ‘gender identity.'”
Additionally, EO 14168 told the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to provide the public with a “clear guidance expanding on the sex-based definitions set forth in this order” within 30 days of the order being issued.
Later that month, Trump issued Executive Order 14187, which was titled “Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation.” Among other things, the measure prohibited the federal funding of trans procedures for individuals aged 19 and younger.
“Countless children soon regret that they have been mutilated and begin to grasp the horrifying tragedy that they will never be able to conceive children of their own or nurture their children through breastfeeding,” stated EO 14187.
“Moreover, these vulnerable youths’ medical bills may rise throughout their lifetimes, as they are often trapped with lifelong medical complications, a losing war with their own bodies, and, tragically, sterilization.”
Last month, a group of states led by Washington filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration over the orders, being joined by a few unnamed physicians who perform such experimental procedures.
King previously granted a temporary restraining order against the executive orders, while another federal judge in Maryland temporarily blocked the executive order in response to a separate lawsuit filed on behalf of families with trans-identified children.
