Montana State Rep. Zooey Zephyr Says She's 'Thankful' After Judge Blocks Trans Care Ban

A Montana court has blocked enforcement of the state’s ban on gender-affirming care for transgender youth.

Missoula County District Court Judge Jason Marks issued a preliminary injunction Wednesday, saying the state cannot enforce the ban, set to go into effect next week, as the lawsuit against it proceeds.

The ban “is unlikely to survive any level of constitutional review,” and “barring access to gender-affirming care would negatively impact gender dysphoric minors’ mental and physical health,” Marks wrote in his order granting the injunction.

Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte signed the legislation establishing the ban, Senate Bill 99, into law in April, despite pleas from his gay nonbinary son. It prohibits the provision of puberty blockers, hormones, or surgeries to people under 18 for the purpose of gender transition. It also bans the so-called promotion of gender transition, including social as well as medical transition, apparently the first law to cover social transition. Health care providers who violate the law could see their licenses suspended for up to a year and could be sued by patients and their families.

Two families with trans children and two doctors filed suit over the law in May, saying it violates the Montana constitution’s guarantees of equal protection, due process, privacy, dignity, and the right to seek medical care. They are represented by Lambda Legal, the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Montana, and the law firm of Perkins Coie.

“We are gratified the judge understood the danger of denying transgender Montana youth access to gender-affirming care as the challenge to this cruel and discriminatory law proceeds,” Lambda Legal staff attorney Kell Olson said in a press release. “Transgender youth in Montana will continue to thrive, and removing this looming threat to their well-being is an important step in allowing them to do so.”

“We are so thankful for this opportunity to protect trans youth, their families, and their medical providers from this baseless and dangerous law,” added Malita Picasso, staff attorney for the ACLU’s LGBTQ & HIV Project. “While this fight is not over, every day that transgender Montanans are able to access this care is a critical and life-saving victory. We will never stop opposing this ban and all others like it until every transgender person has the care and support they need to thrive.”

“Today’s ruling permits our clients to breathe a sigh of relief,” said Akilah Deernose, executive director of the ACLU of Montana. “But this fight is far from over. We look forward to vindicating our clients’ constitutional rights and ensuring that this hateful law never takes effect.”

Montana Rep. Zooey Zephyr, who was barred from the House chamber after saying during debate on the bill that legislators who supported it would have blood on their hands, issued a statement praising Judge Marks's action. Zephyr, a trans woman, noted that those legislators would not listen to her, other trans people, or medical providers, but they have to listen to the courts.

"I am so thankful that the trans youth who need access to this care will be able to receive it," she wrote, while acknowledging the legal fight is not over. "I am grateful for the families who have stood up for their children in the face of a legislature that was hell bent on discriminating against transgender people. And I am happy that the court recognized that these bills are discriminatory and unconstitutional."

Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen, who is defending the law, plans to appeal, spokesperson Emilee Cantrell told Reuters. Cantrell cited the “irreversible and immediate harms that the procedures have on children.”

Federal district courts have blocked such bans in Arkansas, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, and Tennessee, and in June, the court in Arkansas went further, striking down the ban in the first ruling on the merits of such a law, finding it violated the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment as well as the equal protection and due process clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment.

In August, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals allowed Alabama’s ban to take effect while a legal challenge against it proceeds. On September 1, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments on lower court rulings blocking bans in Kentucky and Tennessee, and it is expected to issue a ruling this week.

In June 2023, a federal court in Arkansas struck down that state’s ban on gender-affirming care in the first ruling on the merits of such a law, finding it violated the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment, and First Amendment of the United States Constitution.