Press Release  AG Campbell Wins Lawsuit Protecting Gender-Affirming Care

BOSTON — Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell and a coalition of 22 states secured a federal court order blocking an unlawful attempt by the Trump Administration to threaten healthcare providers that provide care for youth with gender dysphoria. A federal district court issued a written opinion and judgment granting the plaintiff states’ summary judgment motion. 

“This ruling is a decisive rejection of the federal government’s attempt to intimidate providers and deny young people access to medically necessary, life-saving care,” said AG Campbell. “The harm from these threats is already being felt, including here in Massachusetts where some providers have scaled back or declined to offer care out of fear of federal retaliation. This decision helps protect providers and affirms that medical decisions belong with patients, their families, and their doctors – not the federal government.” 

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” and threatened to punish any doctors, hospitals, and clinics that continued to provide such care by excluding them from the federal Medicare and Medicaid programs. 

AG Campbell and the coalition immediately 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. 

At the end of a summary judgment hearing last month, a federal judge agreed with the states and issued an oral ruling blocking the federal government’s threats. Today’s written opinion and judgment effectuate that prior ruling and protect healthcare providers and hospitals from the potentially destabilizing effects of HHS’s unlawful actions. 

Joining AG Campbell in this lawsuit are the attorneys general of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawai’i, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, Wisconsin, and the governor of Pennsylvania.

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