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The prominent officials take a stand for traditional Republican values against the discriminatory law in a U.S. Supreme Court amicus brief.
More than 30 Republicans have signed a friend-of-the court brief, also known as an amicus brief, supporting opponents of Tennessee’s anti-transgender health care law as they take their fight to the U.S. Supreme Court. The signatories include former members of Congress and several other prominent individuals.,
At issue is Tennessee’s 2023 law, known as Senate Bill 1, banning gender-affirming care for transgender youth. The law uses the threat of legal action against health care providers and suspension of medical licenses to ensure compliance.
The lawsuit, now known as United States v. Skremetti, is scheduled for arguments before the Supreme Court later this year. The plaintiffs sought an injunction against the law as their suit worked its way through the courts, but the law was allowed to take effect.
The plaintiffs in the case are three transgender adolescents, identified as L.W., Ryan Roe, and John Doe, and their parents, Samantha and Brian Williams, Rebecca Roe, and Jane and James Doe. Tennessee-licensed physician Susan N. Lacy is also a plaintiff on behalf of her patients. The federal government has joined the suit as well.
Amicus briefs are filed by people and organizations not directly involved in a case but with an interest in its outcome. In the GOPers' brief, the signatories describe themselves as “Republicans and political conservatives from diverse backgrounds who have served as federal, state, and local officeholders or as senior advisors to such officials” who “share the conservative principle of a commitment to limited government and respect for families and the crucial role of parents — in particular, the rights of parents to make weighty decisions about the upbringing and medical care of their own children.”
At issue, they say, are traditional Republican values of limited government and individual liberties.
“Parents want their children to be safe, happy, and healthy. Parents of transgender children are no different,” the brief reads. “Reasonable people can disagree about what is best for kids, but the question presented here is who makes that decision: their parents or government bureaucrats?”
Among the signatories are seven former members of Congress: Christopher Shays (Connecticut), Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (Florida), Susan Molinari (New York), Deborah Pryce (Ohio), Claudine Schneider (Rhode Island), and Barbara Comstock and Denver Riggleman (Virginia). There are also current state legislators Dan Zwonitzer (Wyoming), Chris Sander (Missouri), and Chad Ingels (Iowa).
Ros-Lehtinen, who has a trans son, told NBC News it was “imperative that we come together as Republicans, conservatives, parents and advocates to stand in support of individual liberties and non-discrimination protections while preserving limited government and parental rights.”
The parent plaintiffs echoed similar concerns when they filed their challenge.
“It was incredibly painful watching my child struggle before we were able to get her the life-saving healthcare she needed. We have a confident, happy daughter now, who is free to be herself and she is thriving,” Samantha Williams said in a statement announcing the suit last year. “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.”
L.W., Williams’s daughter with husband Brian and also a plaintiff in the case, shared similar concerns.
“I don’t even want to think about having to go back to the dark place I was in before I was able to come out and access the care that my doctors have prescribed for me,” L.W. said in a statement last year. “I want this law to be struck down so that I can continue to receive the care I need, in conversation with my parents and my doctors, and have the freedom to live my life and do the things I enjoy.”
The law is part of a broader attempt to use state legislatures to limit gender-affirming care to trans youth. Currently, 26 states have some form of law banning or restricting access to gender-affirming care for trans youth.
The signatories decried what they see as an infringement on the rights of parents to make appropriate medical choices for their children without government interference. They also warn of potential government overreach as well.
“Examples of potential government overreach stretch far beyond the context of transgender identity and medical care and could easily be multiplied,” the brief warns. “For instance, consider whether states or local jurisdictions might enact laws or policies that disregard parental choice and consent regarding ‘unhealthy’ foods, ‘dangerous’ sports or athletic activities, or even ear piercings for girls and circumcision for boys. No one wants a system in which parents’ basic judgments in raising and caring for their children are overridden at every turn by politicians and bureaucrats who disagree with the parents’ choices. But that is where the State’s logic leads, putting a host of routine parental decisions up for grabs by the government.”
The plaintiffs fell back on the Constitution to support their case.
“Thankfully, the Constitution safeguards the rights of all parents against governmental policies that seek to control their children, regardless of whether the policy is popular with conservatives or liberals,” the brief concludes. “This Court should enforce that constitutional protection and reject Tennessee’s selective withdrawal of parental authority.”
