A federal court has partially blocked Alabama’s recently passed law banning the prescription of puberty-blocking medication to minors.
Judge Liles Burke of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama issued a preliminary injunction against the law Friday night, ruling in favor of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and private plaintiffs.
Burke, who was appointed to the federal judiciary in 2018 by former President Donald Trump, wrote in his order that the plaintiffs would likely prove that the law’s provisions prohibiting children from utilizing puberty-blocking medication was unconstitutional.
“Defendants produce no credible evidence to show that transitioning medications are ‘experimental,'” wrote Burke. “While Defendants offer some evidence that transitioning medications pose certain risks, the uncontradicted record evidence is that at least twenty-two major medical associations in the United States endorse transitioning medications as well-established, evidence-based treatments for gender dysphoria in minors.”
Other provisions of the controversial law, titled the Alabama Vulnerable Child Protection Act, remain in effect. The law, sponsored by State Sen. Shay Shelnutt (R-Trussville), also bans gender-altering surgeries from being performed on minors.
In a statement issued Saturday, the Office of Attorney General Steve Marshall said the state’s chief law enforcement officer was “disappointed” in the order and advised that Marshall “is already working on filing an appeal in defense of the law.”
As she signed the bill into law last month, Gov. Kay Ivey touted the legislation and touched on what she saw as the need to “protect our children from these radical, life-altering drugs and surgeries when they are at such a vulnerable stage in life.”
Dylan Smith is a staff writer for Yellowhammer News. You can follow him on Twitter @DylanSmithAL
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