Trans youth, families and a doctor file suit challenging anti-trans Oklahoma law
Dr. Shauna Lawlis, left, and Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt Just a day after Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt signed SB 613 into law, banning gender affirming healthcare for transgender minors in the state, trans rights advocates have filed suit to challenge the new law.
SB 613 bans all forms of gender-affirming medical treatment for transgender youth and threatens providers who violate the law with a felony conviction and discipline from their professional licensing boards.
In a lawsuit filed today (Tuesday, May 2) by Lambda Legal, the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Oklahoma and the law firm Jenner & Block LLP, a group of families with transgender adolescents and Dr.
Shauna Lawlis of OU Health “assert SB 613 unjustly and unfairly targets them and gender-affirming health care in violation of their rights under Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment,” according to a press release from Lambda Legal. “Based on nothing but animus towards transgender people and a campaign of misinformation and disinformation, Oklahoma officials have decided to prohibit the provision of necessary, safe and effective evidence-based medical care for trans adolescents in Oklahoma,” said Omar Gonzalez-Pagan, counsel and health care strategist at Lambda Legal. “These actions risk the health, the well-being and the very lives of trans youth in the Sooner State.
