First transgender attorney to argue before the Supreme Court, challenging health care ban for minors
WASHINGTON — When the Supreme Court this week delves into the controversial issue of transgender rightsthe judges will hear from a lawyer with in-depth knowledge.
Chase Strangio will be the first openly transgender lawyer to argue before the nation’s highest court, representing families who say Tennessee’s health care ban for transgender minors leaves their children terrified about the future.
The arguments in the case come amid increased pressure on transgender rights, including a presidential campaign involving Republicans Donald Trump put down his fierce opposition front and middle.
Strangio will bring months of intensive legal preparation to the case, as well as hard-won lessons from his own experience.
“I can do my job because I have had this health care that has transformed and, quite frankly, saved my life,” he said. “I am a testament to the fact that we live among everyone.”
Strangio grew up outside Boston and came out as trans while in law school. Now 42, he is a American Union for Civil Liberties attorney whose legal career included representing former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manningwho challenges a ban on transgender people serve in the army and helping an LGBTQ win case of discrimination against employees at the Supreme Court. He is also the father of a 12-year-old, the son of a Trump-supporting father, and has a close relationship with his Army veteran brother.
He is also an advocate and speaks out about the fact that a number of US states have banned gender-affirming health care for minors. The laws are part of a wave of restrictions on school sports participation and toilet use across the country. After the first openly transgender person was elected to Congress, the Speaker of the House of Representatives Mike JohnsonR-La., stated support for restricting bathroom use to gender assigned at birth.
Tennessee, meanwhile, will argue before the Supreme Court that treatments such as puberty blockers and hormones pose risks to young people and that the law protects them from making treatment decisions prematurely.
“Tennessee, like many other states, has acted to ensure that minors do not receive these treatments until they can fully understand the lifelong consequences or until the science has developed to the point where Tennessee could take a different view of their efficacy,” wrote state attorneys. in lawsuits.
The state’s attorney general, Matt Rice, is arguing for Tennessee. In 2019 he was a clerk at the Ministry of Justice Clarence Thomaswho disagreed with the discrimination case against transgender people, Strangio worked on that term. The attorney general’s office did not make Rice available for an interview ahead of arguments, but his background includes a few years as a minor league baseball player for the Tampa Bay Rays before earning his law degree from the University of California, Berkeley.
The Biden administration is backing the challenge to Tennessee’s law, but the federal government’s position is expected to change after Trump takes office in January. Strangio said he will nevertheless continue to advocate for transgender youth to have access to health care that was not available when he was young.
“Many of us view our childhood and young adulthood as years lost, when we simply had our bodies stripped of our core,” he said. Major medical groups, including the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatricsare against the bans and have endorsed such care, saying it is safe if applied properly. Strangio also pointed out that many medical interventions for young people, such as gastric bypass surgery for weight loss, carry some risk and that it makes sense to inform families and let them decide.
“There is harm that is compounded when we force young people to deny the care that their doctors, their parents and themselves all agree they need,” he said.
The Supreme Court is expected to rule on the case in the summer.
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Associated Press writer Mark Sherman contributed to this report.