Three transgender people incarcerated in federal custody sued the Trump administration and the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) Friday in a class action lawsuit over new policies restricting their access to gender-affirming care.
The complaint, filed Friday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, challenges one of President Trump’s executive orders and a BOP directive to end treatments, including hormone therapy and surgery, for trans inmates diagnosed with gender dysphoria.
Trump’s Jan. 20 order, which he signed during his first hours back in office, proclaims the government recognizes only two sexes, male and female, and broadly prohibits federal dollars from being used on what he and his administration have called “gender ideology.”
The order instructs Attorney General Pam Bondi and Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem to move transgender women held in women’s facilities to men’s prisons and directs BOP officials to halt the use of federal funds for gender-affirming care. Three federal lawsuits seek to stop the Trump administration from moving trans women to men’s facilities.
A BOP memo issued Feb. 21 instructs officials to comply with Trump’s order by preventing transgender inmates from purchasing “any items that align with transgender ideology,” such as chest binders and hair removal devices, and mandating prison staff to refer to trans individuals using only “pronouns that correspond to their biological sex.” A second memo issued Feb. 28 bars BOP funds from being used on transition-related care.
Two transgender men and one transgender woman in their mid-30s and early 40s are leading the challenge to Trump’s order and the new BOP policies. All three, serving sentences in facilities in New Jersey, Minnesota and Florida, were diagnosed with gender dysphoria by BOP medical providers and have either had their hormone treatments suspended or were told they will be suspended soon.
The lawsuit, which covers roughly 2,000 transgender people incarcerated in federal prisons nationwide, argues that denying them their treatment violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishments.
“By denying Plaintiffs and putative class members medically necessary treatment for their gender dysphoria, Defendants have caused and will continue to cause them harm by withholding effective treatment for an objectively serious medical condition,” states the lawsuit, filed on the plaintiffs’ behalf by the ACLU and the Transgender Law Center.
The Supreme Court has held for nearly half a century that denying incarcerated people medically necessary health care is a violation of their constitutional rights, and federal prisons offered gender-affirming care for trans inmates under the first Trump administration.
“Courts have held time and again that the Constitution requires that prisons provide incarcerated people with medical and mental health care,” said Corene Kendrick, deputy director of the ACLU National Prison Project. “President Trump’s executive order categorically banning all gender-affirming care for transgender people in federal prisons is just as unconstitutional as categorically banning chemotherapy for incarcerated cancer patients or insulin for people with diabetes.”
The issue also played out on the campaign trail last year, with Trump slamming former Vice President Harris over her past support for gender-affirming care for transgender people who are in prison or immigrant detention.
“Trans people aren’t pawns in an ideological battle—they’re people who deserve access to critical medical care like everyone else,” said Michael Perloff, a senior staff attorney at the ACLU.
Spokespeople for the White House and BOP did not immediately return a request for comment.
