Transgender: Trump administration sued by Democrats

Democratic leaders accused the Donald Trump administration of illegally threatening health care providers to stop supporting transgender youth, in a lawsuit filed Friday.

The initiative was signed by the attorneys general of 15 states and the District of Columbia, plus the governor of Pennsylvania.

The complaint comes a month after eight major hospitals and hospital systems — all in states where such care is authorized by state law — announced they would stop or condition the provision of such care .

The Trump administration announced in July that it would subpoena providers of these treatments and investigate them for fraud. It later boasted that hospitals were discontinuing these treatments.

Democrats have claimed that Trump's policies are an attempt to impose a nationwide ban on the treatment of people under 19 —which is illegal because there is no federal mandate prohibiting the provision of such care to minors.

"The federal government is engaging in cruel and targeted harassment of providers who provide legitimate, life-saving care to children," the New York State Attorney General said in a statement.

Trump counters that these treatments create permanent changes that people who receive them may later regret — and insists they are based on dubious science.

Since 2021, 28 Republican states have adopted policies banning or limiting gender-affirming care for minors.

In June, the Supreme Court ruled that states had the power to enforce these laws .