Attorney General Ellison wins lawsuit protecting gender-affirming care
In AGs’ lawsuit against Sec. Kennedy ‘declaration’ attempting to block youth access to gender-affirming care and threatening care providers, court issues written order after granting summary judgment from bench in March
Court order: ‘Unserious leaders are unsafe… This case highlights a leader’s unserious regard for the rule of law… Secretary Kennedy’s unlawful declaration harmed children. This case illustrates that when a leader acts without authority and in the absence of the rule of law, he acts with cruelty.’
April 21, 2026 (SAINT PAUL) — Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison and a coalition of 22 states have secured a written federal court order blocking an unlawful attempt by the Trump Administration to threaten healthcare providers that provide care for youth with gender dysphoria. This order comes in the December 2025 lawsuit that Attorney General Ellison and the coalition filed against U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. to block Kennedy’s so-called “declaration” that threatened providers of gender-affirming care for youth and baselessly and unlawfully attempted to limit young people’s access to that care.
In the order (pp. 1-2), the court writes,
Unserious leaders are unsafe. There is nothing more serious than our leaders’ dedication to the rule of law so that we might maintain the integrity of our constitutional democracy. This case highlights a leader’s unserious regard for the rule of law. This case demonstrates how disregard for the rule of law does not merely result in an abstract infraction. Rather, and tragically, this case is one of a long list of examples of how a leader’s wanton disregard for the rule of law causes very real harm to very real people. […]
Secretary Kennedy’s utter failure to promulgate rules in accordance with statutory authority, but instead threaten to cease federal funding to medical providers almost immediately after the declaration, caused chaos and terror for all those people and institutions of our great nation. Secretary Kennedy’s unlawful declaration harmed children. This case illustrates that when a leader acts without authority and in the absence of the rule of law, he acts with cruelty.
“Gender-affirming care is healthcare, and only patients and doctors, and parents when appropriate, should be making those decisions,” Attorney General Ellison said. “Kennedy’s so-called ‘declaration’ was driven purely by politics and ideology, not professional standards of care that states alone have the authority to set. I’m gratified that the court’s written order and judgment so soundly reject the extraordinary steps the Trump Administration took to skirt the rule of law and gaslight the court into believing it didn’t. It’s particularly important that the court took the step of permanently blocking Kennedy and HHS from trying anything like this in the future.”
On December 18, 2025, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued a declaration asserting that certain forms of gender-affirming care are “unsafe and ineffective.” In the declaration, Secretary Kennedy attempted to give HHS the power to exclude healthcare providers from Medicare and Medicaid programs simply for providing care for transgender adolescents.
Five days later, Attorney General Ellison and the coalition sued in the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon, arguing that Secretary Kennedy lacked the legal authority to issue the declaration; that HHS’s actions were arbitrary and capricious; and that the agency failed to adhere to the necessary procedural requirements for notice-and-comment rulemaking.
On March 19, at the end of a summary judgment hearing in the case, a federal judge agreed with the states, granting the plaintiff states’ motion for summary judgment on all counts and issuing an oral ruling blocking the federal government’s threats. In the written order issued Saturday, April 18, the court expanded on its reasoning for permanently blocking the declaration. It further granted the requests of Attorney General Ellison and the coalition to vacate the declaration; to declare that that HHS lacks the authority to unilaterally established standards of care that supersede state-based standards or to exclude providers of gender-affirming care from participating in federal healthcare programs; and to block the federal government from making any future attempt to “unilaterally and categorically supersede statewide standards of care governing gender-affirming care.”
The court’s written opinion and judgment now issued put its prior bench ruling into effect and protect healthcare providers and hospitals from the potentially destabilizing effects of HHS’s unlawful actions.
Joining Attorney General Ellison in this lawsuit are the attorneys general of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawai’i, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, and Wisconsin, and the governor of Pennsylvania.
