A federal judge in Baltimore has temporarily blocked enforcement of the Trump administration’s effort to restrict gender-affirming care for transgender Americans under 19 years old. The temporary restraining order, handed down Thursday by U.S. District Judge Brendan A. Hurson, comes as hospitals and clinics around the country have shut down gender-affirming care for trans minors. 

Hurson granted the order in response to a lawsuit brought by LGBTQ+ advocacy groups this month. In that lawsuit, transgender adolescents and young adults living in Maryland, New York, Massachusetts and Virginia said they were suddenly denied gender-affirming care. In all of those states except Virginia, transgender health care is explicitly protected under state law. The plaintiffs said that their appointments to start hormone treatments or puberty blockers were canceled with little warning or that they were blocked from routine check-ups. 

Those last-minute cancellations took place after President Donald Trump signed an executive order January 28 threatening federal funding for hospitals, clinics and medical schools that provide gender-affirming care to minors. The lawsuit alleges that renowned and well-staffed gender clinics including the Children’s National Hospital in Washington, D.C.; NYU Langone Health; and GeMS at Boston Children’s Hospital all denied gender-affirming care to patients — and that some did so while citing the Trump administration or its new policies. 

According to the Associated Press, Hurson’s ruling will be in effect for 14 days, with a possibility of extension, as the case progresses in federal court. 

According to the the Williams Institute at UCLA, trans youth enrolled in Medicaid, Medicare and other health assistance programs — as well as trans dependents of military service members — are disproportionately impacted by Trump’s executive order. The institute, which regularly publishes research on LGBTQ+ issues, estimates that over 180,000 trans youth may face new barriers to health care access because of it. Those trans youth live in states where the care had been unrestricted until now. 

The lawsuit, PFLAG v. Trump, also takes aim at the Trump administration for targeting transgender people through multiple executive orders. The suit says Trump’s order threatening federal funding for gender-affirming care, alongside another executive order that broadly declared the administration’s stance that trans and nonbinary people don’t exist, are part of a “broad and sweeping attack” on trans people. 

On Thursday, Hurson seemed to indicate that he agreed. Trump’s executive order focused on throttling gender-affirming care access “seems to deny that this population even exists, or deserves to exist,” Hurson said Thursday, according to the AP.
Hurson’s ruling also follows growing protests in support of transgender youth: this weekend in New York City, thousands gathered to protest the executive order blocking gender-affirming care. In Washington on Thursday, protesters also rallied against the executive order and demonstrated to protest a ban on drag performances at the Kennedy Center.