Texas and Montana Sue Biden Administration Over LGBTQ Health Protections

Texas and Montana are suing the Biden administration over a new rule that would prohibit state Medicaid programs from prohibiting gender-affirming care.

The lawsuit by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) and Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen (R), filed Monday, asks a federal court to strike down a sweeping final rule that aims to strengthen the protecting health care against gay and transgender discrimination.

“Through a sweeping new rule enacted under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), those who do not conform to the Biden administration’s gender ideology regime risk losing all federal healthcare funds, including Medicaid dollars and Medicare,” the lawsuit states.

The lawsuit argues that the rule is an unconstitutional attempt to override state law and that the ACA never authorized the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) or any government agency to compel institutions to perform or pay for health-affirming treatments. gender.

The complaint centers on Section 1557 of the ACA, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, age and disability in certain health care programs and activities.

Section 1557 has been subject to a wave of litigation over the past decade as advocacy groups and lawmakers fight over how the policy should be interpreted.

The Obama-era rule interpreted protections against sexual discrimination to include gender identity and sexual stereotypes (among other identities), but not sexual orientation. The Trump administration removed these protections, but the Biden administration then moved to reinstate and expand them, adding sexual orientation.

The Biden administration’s final rule, released in late April, said that organizations that receive federal health funding and health insurers that do business through government plans cannot refuse to provide gender-affirming care services that would be provided to an individual for other purposes.

Furthermore, the rule categorically prohibited exclusions from gender-affirming care.

For example, if a covered entity performs a hysterectomy for the purpose of treating uterine cancer, it must also be willing to remove a healthy uterus for the purpose of facilitating a gender transition.

The Biden administration made clear in the rule that federal protections for religious freedom and conscience still apply. These protections say that health care providers do not engage in discrimination if they refuse to provide abortion or any other care that conflicts with a “sincerely held belief.”

But the rule makes clear that Section 1557 preempts state laws that prohibit access to gender-affirming care.

“The rule will wreak financial havoc on Montana’s medical system, as the state receives nearly two billion dollars in federal financial aid administered by HHS every year. This new rule imposes illegal restrictions on that aid, penalizing Montana for trying to protect its citizens from harmful medical procedures and for refusing to insure those procedures in its health plans,” Knudsen said in a statement.

This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story