Why did Alabama families drop their challenge to an anti-transgender law?

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Sara O’Neal is leaving the state.

She’s following her daughter, who left Alabama to live somewhere that is safer for transgender people, like herself. 

“Why would I live somewhere where if my daughter came to visit, there’s a 50 percent or greater chance that she would be ostracized or marginalized,” O’Neal said.

O’Neal and her daughter Sydney had to scramble to get hormone medications back in 2022. That was when Alabama law made it a felony for doctors to prescribe puberty blockers or hormone treatments for transgender people under 19. O’Neal said had they not been able to get those medications back then, their options were limited.

“There is no way that I could have dealt with more years of waking up every single night, going to check to make sure that my daughter was still alive,” O’Neal said.

O’Neal is referring to suicidal ideation, something Sydney was not alone in struggling with as a transgender child in a state with strict anti-transgender laws. Alabama parents sued the state over the law, but they dropped the suit earlier this month. When they did, Attorney General Steve Marshall issued a statement calling the move a historical win for Alabama.

O’Neal disagrees. 

“Withholding any type of gender-affirming care and putting in these strict laws in place is like looking a 7-year-old, type 1 diabetic in the face and saying, ‘Haha, you think you need insulin? Too bad,’” O’Neal said.

Marshall did not return multiple requests for an interview. But in the statement, he said a lack of evidence prompted the families to drop their challenge, alleging that gender-affirming treatments for transgender minors were crafted by lawyers and activists. He argued medical organizations misled parents and promoted unproven treatments with scant evidence to support their recommendations.

“It is unequivocally false,” said Morissa Ladinsky, a former gender clinician at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Ladinsky said physicians and the scientific community are held to high standards of ethical conduct and that oversight and accountability is built into their profession. Ladinsky added doctors take the Hippocratic Oath very seriously.

“Evidence based, standard of care medicine is what we take an oath to provide our patients,” Ladinsky said. 

Jennifer Levi, senior director at GLAD Law, worked directly with the families who challenged Alabama’s law.

“What the district court saw was the consensus position across the medical community that for transgender adolescents who need medical care, being able to secure it allows them to thrive,” Levi said. 

Levi said a lack of medical evidence did not prompt the families to drop the suit. Rather, their so-called final straw cropped up more recently.

“It’s been a really grueling experience for these families because of the hostility directed towards transgender young people, not just in Alabama, but now across the country,” Levi said.

Through their challenge, the families were able to get a partial injunction against the law, although that was eventually lifted. But in the end, Levi said they did their part. Now the future of Alabama’s law will be decided elsewhere. 

“The most significant piece of it is that the legal issue is going to be resolved by the Supreme Court,” Levi said.

The high court is considering a challenge to a similar law in Tennessee. Attorneys say the families ultimately dropped their challenge of Alabama’s law, not because of a lack of evidence, but because the decision now lies with the Supreme Court. A ruling on the case is expected in early June.