Local legal experts are forecasting the breakdown of transgender rights in schools and healthcare under Republican President-elect Donald Trump’s second administration.
During his presidential campaign, Trump called for rolling back civil rights protections for transgender people, including protections in schools covered by Title IX, reported the Associated Press.
American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in Minnesota staff attorney Catherine Ahlin-Halverson said she expects the Trump administration to not only ban certain anti-discriminatory laws but also weaponize current laws intended to protect individuals.
“They will argue that requiring the federal government not to discriminate against LGBTQ people, violates the constitutional equal protection clause,” Ahlin-Halverson said. “They will argue that that is harming others.”
Gender Justice’s Legal Director Jess Braverman said Trump could rescind protections through executive orders or by enforcing new laws in new ways, such as the Comstock Act being used to restrict abortion access at the state level.
Rolling back protections could mean banning trans athletes from joining sports teams or enforcing bathroom access based on the gender assigned at birth and not gender identity, Braverman said. Changing names and pronouns on official educational documents could also become prohibited.
University of Minnesota law professor Alexander Boni-Saenz said he imagines Trump will deny Medicare and Medicaid to fund gender-affirming care for minors. There are 26 states, including North Dakota and South Dakota, that have bans on gender-affirming care to minors, according to the Human Rights Campaign.
“I will then ask Congress to permanently stop federal taxpayer dollars from being used to promote or pay for these procedures and pass a law prohibiting child sexual mutilation in all 50 states,” Trump said in a recent video.
Democratic President Joe Biden’s administration expanded protections for transgender rights within the healthcare industry. The Department of Health and Human Services advanced protections by withholding federal funding from care providers and insurers who discriminate based on sexual orientation.
Braverman said their organization is concerned about possible rollbacks to Title IX protections in schools and sex discrimination protections in the Affordable Healthcare Act.
“There is a concern though that the Trump administration will go further and withhold funding from schools or entities that are inclusive,” Braverman said. “That’s when things start to get really tricky.”
Boni-Saenz said in an email statement that many transgender people already fear the possibilities Trump might do in office due to anti-transgender ads his campaign ran against Kamala Harris.
“Kamala Harris is for they/them, and Donald Trump is for us,” said one of the ads.
Ahlin-Halverson said the Minnesota branch of the ACLU will focus its efforts on advocating for a gender inclusion bill that was introduced in the state’s last legislative session. The bill would guarantee student access to public school programs and extracurriculars regardless of gender identity.
“We think it would be an important protection for our LGBTQ+ in our school,” Ahlin-Halverson said. “We will fight for the rights of any LGBTQ+ student who experiences discrimination in their school district.”
Braverman said they urge people to “read beyond the headlines” on Trump’s administration before assuming their rights are gone. There is still an administrative process the Trump administration will have to go through, Braverman said, so people will not see their rights disappear immediately.
“Don’t just assume your rights are gone because that’s as good as them actually being gone,” Braverman said.
