Illinois joins lawsuit against White House's attempted national ban on youth gender-affirming care
Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul joined 19 other attorneys general in suing the Trump administration over its attempt at a near nationwide ban on gender-affirming care for patients under 19-years-old.
Earlier this month, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services unveiled a series of regulatory actions designed to block access to gender-affirming care for minors, including threats to cut off federal Medicaid and Medicare funding from hospitals that provide the care to minors.
Medicaid programs in nearly half the states, including Illinois, currently cover gender-affirming care. At least 27 states have adopted laws restricting or banning the care.
The suit, filed in Oregon District Court, said the Trump administration was circumventing the usual legal methods for rule changes in an attempt to create a near nationwide ban on gender-affirming care for patients under 18, while threatening Children's Health Insurance Program, or CHIP, funding if it’s used to provide the care to 19-year-olds, who are legal adults.
The attorneys general aim to have the changes deemed illegal, saying the move flies in the face of established federal law around creating Medicare and Medicaid exclusions — overstepping federal power and violating the Administrative Procedures Act — which rests with the states.
“Secretary Kennedy does not have the authority to undermine medical standards of care or set conditions on participation in Medicaid and Medicare through a so-called declaration,” Raoul said, referring to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the secretary of health and human services. “The Trump administration is once again circumventing the law to cruelly target transgender youth and their medical providers. I will continue to take action against attacks on essential health care and the flagrant disregard of the rule of law, and I continue to stand with transgender youth and their medical providers.”
Co-signed on the suit with Raoul are the attorneys general of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin as well as the governor of Pennsylvania.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The proposals announced by Kennedy and his deputies are not yet final or legally binding. Officials must go through a rule-making process, including periods of public comment, which ends Feb. 17, 2026, as well as document rewrites before the restrictions become permanent. They’re also facing legal challenges from groups such as the ACLU.
The department’s move is an attempt to put it in step with President Donald Trump’s Jan. 28, 2025, executive order that threatened to pull federal funding from hospitals providing the care.
Both Trump administration actions run counter to the recommendations of major U.S. medical societies — including the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Medical Association — though they have still led to many hospitals cutting treatment for thousands of patients out of fear of reprisals from the federal government.
“Research and clinical data support gender-affirming care as a safe and effective treatment for gender dysphoria in adolescents,” the suit reads. “Conversely, untreated gender dysphoria can have devastating impacts to the mental health and well-being of those youth and adolescents, and can lead to increased incidence of anxiety, depression, eating disorders, substance abuse, self-harm and suicidality. For many patients, medically necessary gender-affirming care is life-saving.”
The suit comes months after Illinois joined in a separate lawsuit with more than a dozen other attorneys general alleging the Trump administration overstepped its authority by threatening health care providers with federal investigations and criminal prosecutions, according to a statement announcing the lawsuit.