Supreme Court ruling could strain Minnesota’s providers of transgender care for minors

A U.S. Supreme Court ruling this week upholding a Tennessee ban on many gender-affirming treatments for minors could further strain Minnesota care providers.

Minnesota’s protections for transgender youth remain in place under state law.

Rep. Leigh Finke, DFL-St. Paul, the first transgender person elected to the Legislature, said Wednesday’s ruling will likely spark fear and panic among transgender and nonbinary teenagers and their families in states like Tennessee.

Finke said they may now be searching for gender-affirming care options across the country.

“They will look for answers, and one of those answers is Minnesota,” she said. “I’m sure that there will be additional strain on our system.”

Minnesota became a legal refuge for transgender people in 2023 when lawmakers passed a measure introduced by Finke that protects patients and providers of gender-affirming care. Since then, families from more than 20 states have moved to Minnesota to access that care.

The Supreme Court’s decision does not ban gender-affirming care nationally; it ruled that Tennessee’s law does not violate the 14th Amendment.

Chief Justice John Roberts, writing the majority opinion, said the court was not weighing in on whether gender-affirming care is good or bad. Instead, he wrote, it was deciding only whether Tennessee’s ban on such care for minors violates the Constitution’s equal protection clause.

Roberts wrote that the court would leave the broader policy questions to lawmakers.

The 6-3 vote, with the court’s three liberal members in dissent, comes amid the Trump administration’s aggressive stance against transgender rights.

President Donald Trump, who campaigned on the issue, said during his inaugural speech that the federal government would recognize only two genders: male and female.

The court ruling also comes during a national debate on whether parents should be able to determine gender-affirming care for their children and how transgender athletes should participate in high school and college sports.

The Tennessee law, enacted in 2023, prohibits medical providers from prescribing puberty-delaying medication, offering hormone therapy or performing surgery to treat gender dysphoria.

Nearly 30 states have laws restricting access to gender-affirming care for youth.

LGBTQ and gender advocates across Minnesota condemned the Supreme Court’s decision, warning that it opens the door to broader federal rollbacks of transgender rights.

“Today’s ruling opens the door to broader federal attacks, not only on trans health care, but on the right of all people to make personal medical decisions without political interference,” Brittany Stewart, senior staff attorney at Gender Justice, a Minnesota-based nonprofit gender equity advocacy organization, said in a statement Wednesday.

Kat Rohn, executive director of the Minnesota LGBTQ advocacy organization OutFront Minnesota, said the ruling leaves families navigating a “patchwork of bans that deny transgender youth and their families full access to the care they need.”

Finke said she spoke with several transgender Minnesotans on Wednesday after the Supreme Court ruling, including at the vigil honoring Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark.

“They were mourning the loss of a great leader, a champion of our community, even as we are mourning the loss of our rights and the rights of our family in Tennessee and elsewhere,” Finke said.

When children and families told her that they were scared, Finke said, she told them: “The fight is where we find our meaning. We’ll link our arms together with everyone who will join us.”

A Children’s Minnesota spokesperson said the health system does not currently anticipate any changes and declined to comment further.

The PFund Foundation, a Minneapolis-based LGBTQ nonprofit, supports transgender-serving organizations in Minnesota, Iowa, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wisconsin.

Executive Director Aaron Zimmerman said families from surrounding states are already seeking care in Minnesota — a trend he expects to grow after the Supreme Court’s decision.

“We were just in South Dakota,” Zimmerman said. “We were talking to some of the LGBTQ-serving organizations about the fact that their clients are coming here and needing to access care.”

The Legislature this year awarded PFund $1 million to support training and education for providers offering gender-affirming care and to help them expand services.

Of that, $200,000 was distributed in February. The remaining money will be granted to hospitals and clinics in July to help expand the capacity of their gender-affirming care.

However, Zimmerman said he worries that further federal regulations could jeopardize grants.

The Supreme Court’s decision came the day after the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said it would shut down a national suicide prevention hotline tailored for LGBTQ youth.

The department’s Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration said in a news release that the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline will end its LGBTQ youth-specific services on July 17.

“I can think of nothing more cruel,” Finke said. “It is a signal that there is no acceptable support for queer people under the Trump administration.”

Sen. Scott Dibble, DFL-Minneapolis, also condemned the Supreme Court’s decision and the hotline shutdown.

“Coupled with the news that suicide prevention services will no longer be provided, these decisions will only lead to unnecessary suffering for transgender youth and the wider LGBTQ+ community and continues the demonization and attack of our community,” Dibble, who is openly gay, said in a statement.

Jeremy Olson of the Minnesota Star Tribune contributed to this story.