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Pope urged at LGBTQ meeting to reverse church ban on gender-affirming care

Pope Francis faced calls to overturn the Catholic Church’s ban on gender-affirming care for transgender people on Saturday when he held talks with LGBTQ activists at the Vatican.

The 80-minute meeting, held privately at the guesthouse where the pope lives, included a Catholic sister who works with LGBTQ people, a member of the transgender community, and a U.S. medical doctor who helps run a clinic providing gender-affirming hormonal care for adults.

“I really wanted to share with Pope Francis about the joy that I have being a transgender Catholic person,” Michael Sennett, who took part in the meeting, told Reuters.

Sennett, a transgender man from Boston, said he told the pontiff about “the joy that I get from hormone replacement therapy and the surgeries that I’ve had that make me feel comfortable in my body”.

The unusual encounter was not listed on the Vatican’s official agenda of the pope’s meetings for the day.

The meeting with around a dozen LGBTQ activists comes six months after the Vatican’s doctrinal office firmly rejected gender-affirming care, saying it “risks threatening the unique dignity the person has received from the moment of conception.”

LGBTQ groups sharply criticized the Vatican document and said the doctrinal office did not seek input from transgender people about their experiences before rejecting gender-affirming care.

“We expressed that as the church makes policies in this area that it’s very important to speak with transgender individuals,” said Cynthia Herrick, an endocrinologist at a St. Louis, Missouri, clinic who took part in the papal meeting.

“The pope was very receptive,” said Herrick. “He listened very empathetically. He also shared that he always wants to focus on the person, the well-being of the person.”

Francis, who is 87, has been credited with leading the Catholic Church into taking a more welcoming approach towards the LGBTQ community, and has allowed priests to bless same-sex couples on a case-by-case basis.

But earlier this year he also used a highly derogatory Italian term about LGBTQ people, for which the Vatican apologized on his behalf.”

New Ways Ministry, a U.S.-based advocacy group for LGBTQ Catholics, organized Saturday’s event.

“The message really is that we need to listen to the experiences of transgender people,” said Sister Jeannine Gramick, the group’s co-founder, who asked Francis for the encounter. The meeting “means that the church is coming along, the church is joining the modern era,” she said.

Gramick’s work with LGBTQ Catholics has attracted the ire of Vatican and U.S. Catholic officials for decades, including Pope Benedict XVI. But she has developed a correspondence with Francis, who first welcomed her for a meeting at the Vatican last year.

The Vatican’s press office did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Saturday’s meeting.

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The election could push LGBTQ+ mental health to the edge. Queer activists are fighting for a lifeline.

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Anti-trans legislation sweeping the country is proving deadly. 

A recent study determined that such laws increased suicide attempts among transgender and nonbinary youth by as much as 72%. And that’s just one instance of how LGBTQ+ mental health is on the ballot this election. 

Studies overwhelmingly show that queer people are disproportionately likely to experience depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation or to engage in self-harming behaviors, particularly LGBTQ+ youth. According to the Trevor Project, 41% of queer youth considered taking their own lives within the past year, and an estimated 60% say they were not able to access treatment to care for their psychological and emotional well-being when they needed it. These grave disparities became a topic of national conversation earlier this year after Nex Benedict, a nonbinary Indigenous teen, died one day after being attacked in an Oklahoma high school bathroom. Police say that Benedict took their own life, but family members are pursuing an independent investigation.

The mental health of LGBTQ+ youth and adults is likely to be profoundly affected by the outcome of the 2024 presidential race: If elected to the White House in November, former President Donald Trump has pledged to take federal actionpreventing trans youth from accessing gender-affirming care. His running mate, JD Vance, has called to incarcerate doctors who offer gender-affirming care to young people. 

With the election just weeks away, existing data shows that LGBTQ+ Americans, and especially young people, are acutely aware of the potential fallout of a Trump reelection. The vast majority of trans and nonbinary youth (86%) told the Trevor Project that “recent debates around anti-trans bills have negatively impacted their mental health,” per 2023 data from the national youth suicide organization. 

LGBTQ+ Americans, and especially young people, are acutely aware of the potential fallout of a Trump reelection. 

Hope Giselle, executive director of the National Trans Visibility March, says that she is personally “terrified” about what may be coming next, like many members of the LGBTQ+ community. She wants to believe that voters are “going to do the right thing” but referenced the landmark work of trans pioneers like Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, who were discarded by the mainstream LGBTQ+ movement in the 1970s and 80s as activists pursued a path of assimilationism.

“I want to believe that I should have good faith in folks, but I have seen the way that’s played out for me in the past,” she told LGBTQ Nation. “I’ve seen the way that’s played out for folks that I love. My sisters were at the forefront of this movement and set things up for communities that turned around and booed them at their own rally. Those things can repeat themselves.”

As the LGBTQ+ community nervously braces for an uncertain future, elected leaders are stressing the importance of prioritizing queer mental health as a political issue and raising increased visibility regarding the struggles that some community members are facing. At the federal level, a bipartisan group of lawmakers in the U.S. House of Representatives is pushing the PEER Mental Health Act, which would create grant programs to assist schools in addressing the mental health needs of students. The bill’s lead sponsor, Rep. Becca Balint (D-VT), also introduced the MEND Act, which would provide mental health assistance to local communities following natural disasters, such as those in the Appalachian mountains and Gulf Coast amid the ongoing destruction from Hurricane Helene.

Although the bills don’t specifically name the LGBTQ+ community as an area of focus, Balint says that queer people “get hardest hit” in times of crisis because so many are already living on the margins. LGBTQ+ people are more than twice as likely as the general population to experience homelessness in their lifetimes and also face higher rates of poverty and unemployment. 

Even in a progressive state like Vermont, which she has represented in Congress since 2022, Balint often hears from LGBTQ+ youth in rural areas who are struggling without affirming resources. “It might be easier to be queer or trans in New York or San Francisco,” Balint said that young queer people often tell her, “but in my little town, even in Vermont, I don’t feel supported.”

“It’s so important to me because I was one of those young queer people who knew at a young age that I was gay and felt completely and totally out of sorts,” Balint told LGBTQ Nation. “I have struggled with anxiety and depression my whole life. I want to do everything that I can as an elected official, not just to pass a policy that will help young queer and trans people across the country but also to be a role model by talking about [mental health].”

Mental health and the fight for equality

Teens from various areas of Kentucky gather in front of the Kentucky Capitol Annex building on March 29, 2023, to protest against SB150 which would ban gender-affirming health care for transgender teens.
“To state what your needs are and go after them, that’s a strength,” says Minnesota state representative Brion Curran. Photo: Marcus Dorsey/Lexington Herald-Leader/Tribune News Service via Getty Images.

While addressing the myriad and multifaceted mental health challenges queer people face will take nationwide engagement, LGBTQ+ officials say the cost of not addressing the community’s needs is too high. Minnesota state representative Brion Curran (D) knows this first-hand: They began to experience severe PTSD while training as a deputy police officer and ultimately left their profession because they were afraid of “becoming a statistic.” Now that they are in a better place, Curran is vocal about their struggles to help dispel the silence and shame that remains pervasive around the subject. According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, around 60% of adults who experience mental health issues do not seek treatment, largely due to stigma.

“I’m really open and vocal about people just seeking resources or asking for that support,” Curran told LGBTQ Nation. “That’s not a weakness. To state what your needs are and go after them, that’s a strength. I’m fortunate that I was able to access the resources I need, and I also know that not everybody has those resources.”

Pro-LGBTQ+ legislation, at its core, is mental health legislation.

As an elected official, Curran has sponsored efforts to train therapists to provide appropriate care to first responders and says that the state is working on decreasing burdensome regulations that may prevent people from getting the treatment they need. But they have also been heartened to see the state embrace its role as a safe haven for LGBTQ+ people by passing a law in 2023 declaring Minnesota a refuge for trans youth health care. Curran says that pro-LGBTQ+ legislation, at its core, is mental health legislation because it “encourages positive mental health outcomes for people” who may not have that support from their home states.

Although anecdotal reports from the LGBTQ+ Victory Institute, an organization fighting for increased queer political representation, warned that the mental health of LGBTQ+ electeds could be negatively impacted from constantly fighting on the front lines of equality, Curran maintains that “it’s important to talk about the struggles of specific communities.” 

“It’s important to have people with lived experience at the table where decisions are made,” Curran said. “It’s easy for some issues to get overlooked when there’s not a person in the room directly dealing with that issue. In politics, oftentimes, some of these healthcare issues don’t seem really flashy. They might get lost in the mix, and so it’s important that we have people like me with these life experiences in the room so that we can say, ‘Hey, we can’t forget about this.’ ”

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Florida mom of trans student sues school district, claiming retaliation and violation of rights

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Jessica Norton, a Florida school employee and mother of a transgenderdaughter, is suing the Broward County schools and the Florida State Department of Education, saying they violated her rights by investigating and ultimately disciplining her in retaliation for filing an earlier lawsuit challenging the state’s trans-exclusionary sports law.

Norton had been an employee at Monarch High School in Coconut Creek since 2017; the school is part of the Broward County School District. She was hired as a library media clerk and was promoted to information specialist in 2022, and she received positive reviews along the way, according to the lawsuit, filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida. She became a volleyball coach at the school in 2021. Her trans daughter, D.N., played volleyball for the school briefly, but Norton did not coach her daughter’s team. D.N. had participated in girls’ sports since elementary school.

In 2021, Florida enacted a law barring trans girls from girls’ sports in public schools. Jessica Norton and her husband, Gary Norton, quickly filed a suit challenging the law. To protect their privacy and that of their children, the suit did not use their full names. The suit was dismissed in last November, and the Broward school board began an investigation into Jessica Norton soon after. School officials contended that she had violated that law, even though it can only be enforced against schools, not individuals.

“On information and belief, the Defendants interpreted the Court’s November 6 order as permission to take retaliatory action against Ms. Norton for her family’s decision to invoke their rights under Title IX and the Constitution,” the new suitsays. Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 is the federal law banning sex discrimination in education.

In a November 27 meeting, school officials told Jessica Norton that she had violated 37 requirements for Florida educators, without specifying what she had done to violate them. They reassigned her to warehousing services and told her not to return to Monarch High School unless directed to do so by Craig Kowalski, chief of the school district’s investigative unit. The situation was soon publicized across local and national media, even though investigations of employees are supposed to remain confidential.

“I’ve been through the wringer as far as this investigation,” Jessica Norton said in a recent exclusive interview with The Advocate. “That day, I was told that the investigation was going to be 100 percent confidential and that nobody would know what was going on unless I told them. I left [my daughter] at school because they promised me she would be safe. Within two or three hours of me being home, it was on the news, along with my name and the other people involved. The school board did a press conference with the superintendent, and you know, it was on every news outlet in South Florida and apparently everywhere else.”

“In the days and weeks following the announcement of the Investigation, Ms. Norton and her family endured traumatic stress as the result of anonymous obscene voicemails and text messages, surveillance by neighbors and media, and online harassment,” her suit says. “Out of fear for their physical safety, Ms. Norton’s family had a police car parked outside of their home for several weeks.”

D.N. stopped attending school that day and has been taking classes virtually since. Her mother says no one from the Broward County schools has inquired about D.N.’s well-being.

The investigation and disciplinary actions violated Jessica Norton’s rights under Title IX and the First Amendment, according to the suit. She seeks compensatory and punitive damages, and to bar the school district and the state from taking action against her.

In the suit, she is represented by the Human Rights Campaign Foundation — the educational arm of HRC — and law firm of Arnold & Porter. Named as defendants are the Broward County School Board, the Florida State Department of Education, Broward Superintendent Howard Hepburn, Kowalski, and several other Broward officials.

“For the past eight months, my family has lived in a constant state of limbo and uncertainty — this abusive investigation has added unimaginable stress to our lives,” Norton said in a press release announcing the suit. “At every step of the process, I have been disregarded by the district both as a parent and dedicated employee. I had to sit through an interview where the special investigative unit detectives insisted on referring to my daughter as my son, using he/him pronouns — refusing to use her legal gender — and refusing to use her legal name. I had to read materials in the investigation in which the same detectives referred to my daughter as ‘it.’ District leadership tried to ruin my life, but instead they destroyed the life of an innocent 16-year-old girl.”

“What this school district has put this family through is cruel and immoral,” HRC President Kelley Robinson said in the release. “The Broward County School District has failed at every step to provide Jessica Norton and her daughter with the protection and due process they deserve, let alone any dignity or respect — the Nortons deserve justice. The Nortons were living their lives until the district thrust them into a biased, inflammatory investigation. Jessica Norton isn’t just courageous — she’s the kind of parent every child deserves. She stood against a system that weaponized her love for her child against her livelihood.”

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ICLA Williams Institute Report on Workplace Experiences of Nonbinary Employees

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This report examines experiences of employment discrimination and harassment against nonbinary adults using a survey of 1,902 LGBTQ adults in the workforce, including 163 nonbinary adults, conducted in the summer of 2023. We compare the experiences of nonbinary employees with those of cisgender LGBQ employees and transgender employees who do not identify as nonbinary.

The majority of nonbinary adults in the workforce are under age 35 (87%), and half (51%) are people of color. About three-quarters (74%) of nonbinary people in the workforce are making less than $50,000 a year.

Our analysis indicates that employment discrimination against nonbinary employees is persistent and widespread. At some point in their lives, about six in 10 nonbinary employees (59%) reported experiencing discrimination or harassment at work (including being fired, not hired, not promoted, or verbally, physically, or sexually harassed) because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

Many nonbinary employees reported recent experiences of discrimination and harassment. Within the past year, 16% of nonbinary employees reported that they had been fired, not hired, or not promoted because of their sexual orientation or gender identity, and 20% reported experiencing harassment at work. One in four (26%) nonbinary employees reported experiencing adverse treatment because of their LGBTQ status at their current job.

Many nonbinary employees also reported engaging in actions to avoid discrimination and harassment, including hiding their nonbinary identity and changing their appearance or behaviors. Nearly half (45%) of nonbinary employees were not out to their current supervisor, and 17% were not out to any of their co-workers. Two-thirds (67%) of nonbinary employees reported downplaying their LGBTQ status at work by doing one or more of the following: changing their speech, mannerisms, appearance, or how they dress at work; avoiding work social events; or not talking about their outside activities at work.

Nearly six in 10 (58%) nonbinary employees have looked for another job because of how they were treated based on their sexual orientation or gender identity at work, and half (50%) reported leaving a job because of such treatment.

Along many measures of adverse workplace experiences, nonbinary employees fall in between cisgender LGBQ employees and transgender employees who do not identify as nonbinary, with cisgender LGBQ employees reporting the lowest rates of adverse experiences and transgender employees reporting the highest. In many cases, nonbinary employees’ reports of adverse workplace experiences were closer to the higher levels reported by transgender employees. While the report’s key findings are summarized below, the full report includes quotes from respondents to provide more detail about their experiences of discrimination and harassment in the workplace.

Key Findings

Demographics

  • An estimated 87% of nonbinary adults in the workforce are under the age of 35, compared to 51% of cisgender LGBQ adults and 71% of transgender adults in the workforce.
  • About half (51%) of nonbinary adults in the workforce are people of color.
  • Over 58% of nonbinary adults in the workforce identified as bisexual, 21% selected “something else,” and 4% selected “not sure” to describe their sexual orientation.
  • Almost three-quarters are making less than $50,000 a year (74%), compared to less than half (48%) of cisgender LGBQ adults in the workforce.

Lifetime Experiences of Discrimination and Harassment 

  • At some point in their lives, about six in 10 nonbinary employees (59%) reported experiencing discrimination or harassment at work, including being fired, not hired, not promoted, or verbally, sexually, or physically harassed because of their gender identity.
    • Discrimination: Forty-five percent of nonbinary employees reported experiencing at least one form of employment discrimination (being fired, not hired, not promoted, or being denied other workplace opportunities) because of their sexual orientation or gender identity at some point in their lives.
      • About one in four nonbinary employees reported being fired (23%) and/or not hired (28%) because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.
      • Nonbinary employees also described other types of unfair treatment based on their sexual orientation and gender identity. Some of these experiences included having their shifts changed or their hours reduced, being isolated from other employees or customers, and being excluded from company events.
    • Harassment: Half of nonbinary employees (50%) reported experiencing at least one form of harassment (verbal, physical, or sexual) at work because of their sexual orientation or gender identity at some point in their lives.
      • Forty percent of nonbinary employees reported experiencing verbal harassment from supervisors or co-workers because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. Many nonbinary respondents cited examples of being persistently misgendered, deadnamed, or harassed for not conforming to traditional binary genders or gender stereotypes.
      • About one in five (21%) nonbinary employees reported experiencing physical harassment at work because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. Reports of physical harassment included being “threatened,” “cornered,” “roughhoused,” “assaulted,” “attacked,” and “strangled.”
      • Close to one-third (31%) of nonbinary employees reported experiencing sexual harassment at work because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

Intersectional Discrimination and Harassment 

  • When asked to describe their worst experiences of discrimination and harassment based on sexual orientation and gender identity, many nonbinary employees described intersectional discrimination based on their multiple marginalized identities. Most frequently, in addition to discrimination based on their gender identity, they described discrimination related to being bisexual or based on living with a disability.

Recent Experiences of Discrimination and Harassment 

  • Discrimination: About one in three nonbinary employees (35%) reported experiencing at least one form of employment discrimination (including being fired, not hired, or being denied a promotion or other workplace opportunities) based on their sexual orientation or gender identity within the past five years. One in six (16%) reported these experiences in the past year.
  • Harassment: Four out of ten nonbinary employees (39%) reported experiencing at least one form of harassment (including verbal, physical, or sexual harassment) in the workplace based on their sexual orientation or gender identity within in the past five years and one in five reported (20%) reported these experiences in the past year.
  • Negative comments: In the past year, about half of nonbinary employees (49%) reported hearing negative comments about LGBTQ people in the workplace.

Experiences at Current Job 

  • Respondents were asked specifically about their experiences at their current job. About two-thirds of nonbinary employees (64%) felt that their current workplace environment was somewhat or very supportive of LGBTQ employees. In comparison, approximately one in ten (13%) felt their workplace environment was somewhat or very unsupportive.
  • Approximately one in five nonbinary employees (20%) reported one or more adverse workplace experiences related to their sexual orientation or gender identity at their current job, including 18% who reported unfair treatment, 11% who reported verbal harassment, 7% who felt they had not been promoted or were denied other opportunities in the workplace, 6% who reported sexual harassment, and 1% who reported physical harassment.

Out at Work 

  • Forty-five percent of nonbinary employees reported that they are not open about being nonbinary to their current supervisor, and approximately one in six (17%) reported that they are not out to any of their co-workers. Only one-third (33%) of nonbinary employees reported being out to all their co-workers.

Covering

  • Two-thirds of nonbinary employees (67%) reported engaging in covering behaviors at their current jobs to avoid harassment or discrimination related to their sexual orientation or gender identity. About one-third reported changing how they dressed (35%), their physical appearance (35%), or their voice or mannerisms (36%) at work. Approximately one in five (20%) have changed where, when, or how frequently they used the bathroom.
  • Many nonbinary employees have also avoided work events or work-related travel (25%) and work-related social events (39%) to avoid discrimination and harassment.
  • Many nonbinary employees also avoid talking about their families at work to avoid discrimination and harassment. Twenty-nine percent of nonbinary employees have avoided talking about their family at work, 24% have not brought family to work events, and 21% have not displayed photos of their partner or family at work to avoid discrimination and harassment.

Retention

  • About two-thirds of nonbinary employees (68%) were very or somewhat satisfied with their current job, while almost one in six (17%) were very or somewhat dissatisfied with their current job.
  • Half (50%) of nonbinary employees reported that they had left a job at some point in their lives because of how their employer treated them based on their LGBTQ status. About six in 10 nonbinary employees said that they have looked for other jobs because of how they were personally treated by their employer based on their LGBTQ status (58%) or had looked for another job because the workplace environment was not supportive of LGBTQ people (60%).
  • Due to the workplace environment for LGBTQ people at their current job, one in five nonbinary employees (20%) had considered leaving. Almost two-thirds (65%) of them had taken steps towards finding another job.
  • Nonbinary employees were more likely than cisgender LGBQ employees to have left a job (50% vs. 31%) or looked for another job (58% vs. 32%) because of how they were treated because of their LGBTQ status. Compared to cisgender LGBQ employees, they were also more likely to report they had looked for another job due to the general workplace environment for LGBTQ employees (60% vs. 36%).

Download the full report

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Black trans woman Honee Walker killed in hit-and-run in Rochester, N.Y.

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Honee Walker, a 37-year-old Black transgender woman, was killed in a hit-and-run accident in Rochester, N.Y., last Wednesday.

Walker has been misgendered and deadnamed in local media reports.

The accident occurred just before midnight. Walker was a pedestrian, and the driver who hit her left the scene, TV station WHAM reports. She was pronounced dead soon afterward.

The driver and vehicle have since been identified, but no arrests have been made, and the accident remains under investigation.

After the incident, Walker’s family gave her name to media outlets, but some have not corrected their reporting. The latest WHAM story, however, states her correct name and refers to her as a “pedestrian” and “victim,” with no gender mentioned.

“The victim identified both publicly and privately as a transgender woman,” says a press release from Blaque/Out Magazine.

“Although several stations have posted updates to the story, the accepted media practice would be to correct the original misreported piece in print if possible and digitally everywhere it originally appeared,” the release continues. “This isn’t just new information, it is considered disrespectful and a documented form of transphobia, transmisia, prejudice and oppression visited upon the LGBTQIA+ but specifically the Trans community. Despite the fact that your original reporting information was likely provided by [the Rochester Police Department], organizations nationwide track the disproportionate rate of deaths of Trans community members, specifically Black Trans women and those numbers are deeply skewed when the media misreports the accurate identity of the individual. These errors whether purposeful or in ignorance can even lead to delayed justice for families and victims.”

A celebration of life for Walker will be held October 18 at the Wegman Building in Rochester’s Seneca Park. There will be visitation hours from 1 to 6 p.m. and a memorial service at 6 p.m.

Walker is at least the 28th trans person to die by violence in the U.S. this year. Most of them have been Black women. There are likely many others in any given year who are not counted because of deadnaming or misgendering, or if their deaths are not reported at all.

The Advocate has contacted the Rochester Police Department and local activists for further information and will update this story if we receive responses.

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Missouri “experts” defending gender-affirming care ban exposed as quacks

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In the midst of an ongoing legal battle over Missouri’s ban on gender-affirming care, so-called expert witnesses in favor of the ban have had their credibility called into question, meaning their testimonies may either be thrown out or given little weight in the court’s decisions.

John Michael Bailey, a fringe psychologist who promotes the debunked theory of autogynephilia, was called by Missouri’s Attorney General as an expert witness in support of the legislation, The Missouri Independent reports. Autogynephilia refers to the idea that trans women transition either due to the act of transitioning being a sexual fetish or to lure straight men into a relationship. 

Bailey is also the author of a retracted study on the also debunked concept of “rapid-onset gender dysphoria” (ROGD), the idea that being trans is a trend that youth rapidly latch on to due to social pressure. Bailey was examined by Wright County Circuit Court Judge Craig Carter over the reliability of his study along with his views on some controversial subjects.

Bailey’s study did not verify if any of the participants were actually diagnosed with gender dysphoria. Instead, it surveyed participants from ParentsofROGDKids.com, a website dedicated to parents who believe ROGD is a valid concept that has afflicted their children. The co-researcher on the study was someone under a pseudonym who was tied to the website, and Bailey did not even know who the person actually was.

Bailey has claimed that his study – which was retracted due to issues of informed consent – was actually retracted due to pressure from activists.

Additional work he’s done involved him looking into Reddit threads with people who consider themselves ‘detrans’ and ‘desisting.’ These concepts refer to trans people who have stopped transitioning or stopped identifying as trans.

But the main issue calling his credibility into question centered on Jerry Sandusky, a former college football coach who was convicted of sexually assaulting young boys over the course of 15 years. Bailey believes Sandusky is innocent.

“You believe the people testifying against Jerry Sandusky are lying?” Carter asked him. 

“I can see that if you are not familiar with the evidence that I am familiar with, you would be shocked,” Bailey told him.

Bailey got his information from a podcast and praised conservative commentator John Ziegler.

“Do you know [Ziegler]? Have you talked to anybody that was an eyewitness in that case?” Carter pressed. 

“I have read testimony, but I have not talked to anyone,” Bailey responded.

All of this cast doubt on Bailey’s authority as a medical professional.

The court also called into question the supposed expertise of endocrinologist Dr. Daniel Weiss, as it was revealed that he had not published any research on trans youth and did not have clinical experience with minors. He was paid by the Center for Christian Virtue, a conservative Christian advocacy organization, to serve as an expert witness, the Independent reported.

He said of whether he’d publish research on gender affirming care, “My article, if I were to write one, would be rejected by most medical journals because there is no good treatment. I call it child-harming treatment. There is no good intervention.”

The Missouri bill in question, Senate Bill 49, completely restricts anyone under the age of 18 from accessing any form of gender affirming care, including puberty blockers, hormone replacement therapy, and surgeries.

In addition to the ban, state officials have quietly made it harder to change gender markers on driver’s licenses and have also attempted to restrict care for trans adults.

The fate of gender-affirming care will ultimately be determined by the Supreme Court this fall with the case U.S. v. Jonathan Skrmetti et al, which concerns Tennessee’s ban on care for minors. This case will decide whether or not trans kids will be able to transition in Tennessee, with expectations that it will effect gender-affirming care for all minors across the nation. It is unknown how the Supreme Court will rule, although the current Court has historically ruled conservatively on social issues.

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90% of trans kids get support from parents but half face bullying at school, new report finds

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Transgender and nonbinary youth in the U.S. are usually receiving support from their parents or guardians, but they suffer disproportionately from bullying in school, according to a new report from the Human Rights Campaign Foundation.

The findings are from the foundation’s 2024 Report on the Experiences of Parents of Transgender and Non-Binary Children, which highlights the struggles trans youth continue to face despite increased parental support, released Thursday along with its first Supporting Transgender, Non-Binary, and Gender Expansive Children guide, created by the foundation’s Parents for TransgenderEquality National Council. The foundation is the educational arm of HRC.

More than 92 percent of parents surveyed were supportive of their child’s trans identity, notes the report, which features data collected in collaboration with the University of Florida and University of Arizona from nearly 1,500 parents and caregivers of trans and nonbinary youth aged 18 and under.

But the situation was not so good at school. Fifty-five percent of parents said their child had been bullied at school in the past year. Only 26.2 percent had a gender support plan for their child at school. However, of those who did, more than 90 percent said the support plan was very or somewhat helpful. About one in five parents chose their child’s school or district based on policies regarding LGBTQ+ students. But about one in five also reported that their child’s school was not supportive when it came to restroom use, and a third cited lack of support for locker room use.

And despite parental support, many trans and nonbinary children have experienced mental health challenges. Of the parents surveyed, 39.6 percent said their child had been diagnosed with depression, and 49.4 percent said the child was diagnosed with an anxiety disorder. Sixteen percent said their child had been hospitalized for mental health needs, and among those parents, 33 percent said it was related to their gender identity. Parents and caregivers had challenges too, with about 20 percent screening positive for moderate or severe depression.

The parents surveyed are seeking appropriate health care for their trans and nonbinary children, but some are finding barriers here. Ninety-five percent said their child saw at least one doctor in the prior year who knew the child was trans and that the doctor treated them with respect. However, 24 percent said they had to teach a doctor or health care provider about trans people to receive appropriate care; 5.1 percent had a doctor refuse to give their child trans-related and/or gender-affirming care; 21.6 percent had changed providers at some point due to mistreatment, lack of competency, or other reasons related to gender-affirming care; and 25.1 percent experienced at least one barrier to accessing gender-affirming care for their child.

Children are coming out as trans or nonbinary at a young age, the survey notes. On average, parents and caregivers said their child shared their gender identity with them around 11 years old — and over half shared their identity before the age of 13.

The report indicates that parents and children are engaging in advocacy. Half of parents have written to or called their political representatives regarding trans issues, and 17 percent said their child has spoken publicly about these issues.

Still, more than half of parents said they need more resources to help their children, and the new guide is designed to provide those. “This guide is exactly the tool I needed years ago when my daughter was searching for the words to tell us who she was,” Parents for Transgender Equality National Council member Keisha Bell said in a press release. “The guide highlights the nuances of what it means to care for a trans or nonbinary child while also providing guidance to those who are unsure of how to navigate this transition. From helping find an appropriate clinician to providing detailed steps that help support your child’s needs, this guide provides the resources needed to ensure the trans and nonbinary youth in your life feel seen and understood.”

“Parents have made a great deal of progress towards supporting trans youth, while the schools and systems of care around them are often falling short,” added Shoshana Goldberg, director of public education and research at the HRC Foundation. “By taking simple actions like meeting with the school principal and counselor, connecting with trans-affirming local and online communities, and advocating for their child in health care settings, parents can go a long way towards promoting better outcomes for the trans and nonbinary youth in their lives.”

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Affordable housing project for queer seniors faces setback despite rising need

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A much-needed affordable housing project for LGBTQ+ seniors in San Francisco’s Castro District has hit a setback, as state agency funding was denied, even though the proposal was described as “a great project,” The Bay Area Reporter wrote.

Mercy Housing California, a senior living facility for elderly LGBTQ+ people, had applied for nearly $39 million from the Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities (AHSC) Program, a joint initiative by California’s Department of Housing and Community Development and the Strategic Growth Council. The funds would have funded a 187-unit affordable housing development in the Castro, the city’s historically gay neighborhood.

Amar Cid, deputy director of Community Investments and Planning, said the project had limited funds and much competition, with other applicants scoring higher.

“Round 8 of the AHSC program had many transformative, impactful community projects. Like every round, total project requests far exceeded the available funds. This year, requests were more than double what we could grant. It was a highly competitive process,” he told The Bay Area Reporter.

Cid emphasized that the rejection doesn’t mean the project isn’t valuable. 

“The team met with the 1939 Market Street project team in mid-September to discuss ways to increase their score if they choose to apply in a future round,” he said, emphasizing that he told its organizers to apply again in the future. ” 

“[It’s] a great project … [and] we hope they consider applying in a future round,” he said.

“Why some projects may have been awarded with a lower score than the 1939 Project has to do with other projects perhaps meeting specific [disadvantaged communities] and/or program priorities,” Cid said.

The affordable housing developer is partnering with Openhouse, a San Francisco nonprofit that provides services for LGBTQ+ seniors, to create their third building of below-market-rate apartments, primarily for LGBTQ+ seniors. Previously, the two organizations collaborated on 119 units of affordable, LGBTQ+-friendly senior housing spread across two buildings located at 55 and 95 Laguna Street — both are near the Castro District.

The push for affordable housing in the Castro is especially crucial as LGBTQ+ seniors face unique challenges in finding safe, inclusive living spaces. Mercy Housing’s commitment to resubmitting their application is a step forward, but the struggle for adequate funding continues.

Mercy Housing California said that it will reapply for funding in 2025. In a statement to Bay Area Reporter, the organization expressed hope for next year. 

“Unfortunately, this does push the schedule back one year. However, we remain committed to delivering 187 units of LGBTQ+ friendly housing as soon as possible,” the organization said.

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This Supreme Court case could change gender-affirming care in the U.S. forever

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The controversy over gender-affirming care for trans minors is coming to the U.S. Supreme Court in its new term, which begins Monday — the first Monday in October. A hearing date has not been set, but the case, U.S. v. Skrmetti, over a Tennessee ban on such care, will surely attract much attention when it comes to the court. The American Civil Liberties Union, one of the groups representing the Tennesseans who sued over the law, predicts the hearing will be scheduled for December. Here’s what you need to know about the case, which is the high court’s first opportunity to rule on the issue.

What is the U.S. v. Skrmetti Supreme Court case?

In March 2023, Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee, a Republican, signed Senate Bill 1 into law. It bans surgery, puberty blockers, and hormone treatment for the purpose of gender transition for people under 18. The following month, three families with transgender children and one doctor filed a federal lawsuit challenging the law.

The suit was brought by Samantha and Brian Williams of Nashville and their 15-year-old transgender daughter, two other plaintiff families filing anonymously, and Dr. Susan Lacy of Memphis. They are represented by Lambda Legal, the ACLU and its Tennessee affiliate, and the law firm of Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP. The suit was filed in April 2023 in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee.

It names as defendants Skrmetti, the Tennessee Department of Health, the Tennessee Board of Medical Examiners, and various state officials.

The suit argues that the law violates the U.S. Constitution’s guarantees of equal protection and due process as well as the Affordable Care Act’s Section 1557, which bans sex discrimination in health care, the suit asserts.

“It was incredibly painful watching my child struggle before we were able to get her the lifesaving health care she needed. We have a confident, happy daughter now, who is free to be herself, and she is thriving,” Samantha Williams said in a Lambda Legal-ACLU press release when the suit was filed. “I am so afraid of what this law will mean for her. We don’t want to leave Tennessee, but this legislation would force us to either routinely leave our state to get our daughter the medical care she desperately needs or to uproot our entire lives and leave Tennessee altogether. No family should have to make this kind of choice.”

What’s at stake here for gender-affirming care?

“Our legal challenge is limited to the provisions of Tennessee’s ban targeting hormone therapies — such as hormone replacement therapy and puberty blockers — and does not implicate surgical care,” the ACLU explains on its website, as genital surgery is almost never performed on minors.

“Tennessee’s ban, like every other passed by politicians in recent years, specifically permits these same hormone medications when they are provided in a way that Tennessee considers ‘consistent’ with a person’s sex designated at birth,” the ACLU continues. “This means, for example, a doctor could prescribe estrogen to a cisgender teenage girl for any clinical diagnosis but could not do the same for a transgender girl diagnosed with gender dysphoria.”

A ruling upholding the law could have implications for other types of health care, the ACLU warns. “When arguing against transgender people and their families, states with bans like Tennessee’s have relied heavily on the Supreme Court’s opinion Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade and allowed states to ban abortion,” the organization notes. “U.S. v. Skrmetti will be a major test of how far the court is willing to stretch Dobbs to allow states to ban other health care. The court’s ruling could serve as a stepping stone towards further limiting access to abortion, IVF, and birth control.”

How did U.S. v. Skrmetti get to the Supreme Court?

U.S. District Judge Eli Richardson granted a preliminary injunction in June 2023, blocking the law from being enforced. However, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit lifted that in September 2023. So the plaintiffs are asking the court to review the Sixth Circuit’s decision.

Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, representing the Biden administration, emphasized the need for the court’s intervention, highlighting the “profound uncertainty” faced by transgender adolescents and their families due to conflicting lower court decisions. “This Court’s input is urgently needed to resolve whether these bans are discriminatory,” she said in the government’s petition to the court.

The high court announced in June that it would hear the case.

How might the court rule?

It’s anyone’s guess. The court delivered a major victory for LGBTQ+ people in 2020 in Bostock v. Clayton County, in which it ruled 6-3 that workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity is sex discrimination and therefore banned by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Justice Neil Gorsuch, Donald Trump’s first Supreme Court appointee, wrote the ruling. He was joined by another conservative, Chief Justice John Roberts, and the court’s four liberals — Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor, and Stephen Breyer. Dissenting were conservatives Samuel Alito, Brett Kavanaugh, and Clarence Thomas.

Now the court’s makeup has changed, however. Ginsburg died in 2020 and was replaced by a conservative, Amy Coney Barrett. Breyer retired in 2022 and was succeeded by another liberal, Ketanji Brown Jackson, the first justice appointed by President Joe Biden.

And while Gorsuch and Roberts joined in the Bostock ruling, now the conservatives appear to have dug in, as indicated by the Dobbs ruling, the 6-3 presidential immunity ruling, and the ruling in 303 Creative Services v. Elenis,also 6-3. In the latter, the majority held that Colorado’s LGBTQ-inclusive nondiscrimination law violated a web designer’s freedom of speech — the designer was willing to create wedding websites for heterosexual couples only.

But the plaintiffs have many on their side. In addition to their legal team, they have numerous friend-of-the-court briefs supporting their case. Such briefs are filed by parties not directly involved in a case but wanting to offer an opinion. They have come from both Democratic and Republican politicians, Planned Parenthood, the American Bar Association, the American Psychological Association, the National Women’s Law Center, the American Academy of Pediatrics, trans youth, and many more. Of course, there have been briefs filed supporting Tennessee as well. So we’ll see who convinces the justices.

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Pennsylvania middle school installs surveillance window in gender-inclusive bathroom

A Pennsylvania middle school installed a window in its gender-inclusive restroom, making its interior visible from the school hallway.

The window was constructed at Emory H. Markle Middle School in Hanover, Pennsylvania, which is roughly 5 miles north of the Maryland border. Gender-inclusive bathrooms are commonly used by transgender and nonbinary people for privacy and safety reasons.

Matthew Gelazela, the board president of the South Western School District, said the district decided to add the window as it “engages in renovating multiuser restroom facilities.”

“It has an interest in opening a view into the non-private area of those facilities in similar fashion to what has existed for years in our elementary schools,” Gelazela said in a statement to NBC affiliate WGAL in Lancaster. “In making the area outside of stalls more viewable, we are better able to monitor for a multitude of prohibited activities such as any possible vaping, drug use, bullying or absenteeism.”

Parents in the South Western School District in Hanover, Pa., are taking to social media to call out their school board after pictures surfaced of construction on gender-inclusive bathrooms.
Parents in the South Western School District in Hanover, Pa., are taking to social media to call out their school board after pictures surfaced showing construction of gender-inclusive bathrooms.WGAL

Gelazela added that the window does not provide a “view into those private stall spaces from outside of the restrooms.”

The district did not immediately respond to NBC News’ request for additional comment.

The window installation raised concerns among some of the students’ parents, who said windows were not added to the school’s single-sex multiuser restrooms.

Jennifer Holahan, whose son attends school in the district , said the new window is a “deterrent” to keep students from using the restrooms and a way to single out LGBTQ students who may be more likely to use a gender-inclusive facility.

“I can understand needing to have supervision over middle and high school students, especially in the bathrooms. I was a teenager once; I know it’s a tough spot,” Holahan told WGAL. “But I also think windows aren’t a solution. I think if it was a real issue, it wouldn’t just be gender-inclusive restrooms.”

Emory Markle Middle School in the South Western School District in Hanover, Pa.
Emory H. Markle Middle School in Hanover, Pa.WGAL

The American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania condemned the installation of the window, calling it “discriminatory.”

“Schools should be a welcoming and safe environment that nurture students’ curiosity and well-being,” a spokesperson for the group said in an email. “Discriminatory policies like this one not only undermine those goals, they also make students less safe.”

The issue over whether trans people should be able to use the restroom that aligns with their lived gender has played out in the U.S. for roughly a decade. A transgender “bathroom ban” in North Carolina — which barred trans people from using restrooms and changing facilities that matched their gender identity in most public spaces — caused a national uproar in 2016. (The North Carolina law, HB 2, was partially repealed in 2017.) However, similar laws have rebounded in recent years with legislative success and more muted opposition.

Thirteen states across the country have laws that prohibit transgender people from using bathrooms and facilities consistent with their gender identity in K-12 schools, according to the Movement Advancement Project, an LGBTQ think tank. Some of those state laws — also known as “bathroom bans” — also bar trans people from using restrooms that correspond with their gender identities in some or all government buildings.

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