A case that seeks to block enforcement of a state law restricting transgender minors’ access to gender affirming care is scheduled for two weeks of debate in Cole County Circuit Court (Annelise Hanshaw/Missouri Independent).
A lawsuit filed by transgender children and their parents challenging a one year-old Missouri law restricting minors from accessing cross-sex hormones and puberty blockers heads to trial in Cole County Circuit Court beginning Monday.
Plaintiffs are asking Circuit Court Judge Craig Carter, who typically serves in Wright County, to block the law’s enforcement.
Pretrial briefs filed by plaintiff’s attorneys and the Missouri Attorney General’s office , which is defending the state, have very little in common in the factual background of the case.
The parties have different definitions of gender-affirming care, with Solicitor General Joshua Divine writing that “gender transition interventions are at best experimental and at worst deeply harmful.”
Gillian Wilcox, an attorney with the ACLU of Missouri, labeled the treatment “medically necessary, evidence-based and potentially lifesaving.”