A former case worker of the Washington University Transgender Center at St. Louis Children’s Hospital testified Monday in the trial challenging Missouri’s restrictions on gender-affirming care (Rebecca Rivas/Missouri Independent).
The former caseworker whose account of her time working at a pediatric gender clinic in St. Louis jumpstarted the legislative push to outlaw gender-affirming care for minors testified in defense of Missouri’s restriction on Monday.
Jamie Reed, who for four and a half years worked as a case manager at the Washington University Transgender Center, was the first witness called by the state in the two-week trial over the constitutionality of the law. Reed’s public statements and sworn affidavit about her experience at the clinic were the genesis for Missouri lawmakers prioritizing the ban and spurred broad investigations by the Missouri Attorney General’s Office into practitioners statewide.
Reed testified as a fact witness, meaning she couldn’t speak as an expert but could provide insight into her experiences working at the Transgender Center. Many of Monday’s questions gravitated toward the records she kept — and later shared — that contained information on the center’s patients.