The ACLU of Indiana has filed to dismiss its class action lawsuit challenging Indiana's gender affirming medical care ban in a federal district court.
Transgender youth lost access to the care in Indiana after former Gov. Eric Holcomb signed a law in 2023. It prohibited physicians from providing it to transgender youth, among other provisions.
Gender-affirming care is interdisciplinary healthcare that treats a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria. It is supported by major medical associations.
The ACLU challenged the law, arguing that it violated the Constitutional rights of transgender youth, their parents and care providers, including equal protections under the law, due process, and First Amendment rights. But circumstances have changed after multiple federal court rulings, the legal group said
"We did not see a viable way of going forward at this time … If the law changes in the future, there is a procedure to reopen this case by someone who's aggrieved," said ACLU legal director Ken Falk.
After winning a preliminary injunction in 2023 from the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana — which held they were likely to succeed based equal protection and First Amendment claims — the ACLU encountered two legal setbacks.
In Nov. 2024, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh District overturned the preliminary injunction in the case, ruling that the court did not believe plaintiffs were likely to succeed based on equal protection or due process claims. Then last year, in a separate case, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld state laws banning gender affirming medical care for minors in U.S. v. Skrmetti.
"For the reasons in the motion and the parties' joint stipulation, the Court 'will likely be able to' approve the voluntary dismissal as fair, reasonable, and adequate under recent binding precedent from the Supreme Court and Seventh Circuit," wrote District Judge James Patrick Hanlon in a June 24 order.
Since it is a class action lawsuit, transgender youth and their parents may write comments to the ACLU by July 24.
"In every class action we file that is settled, this is the process we go through: notice, opportunity to be heard, then a fairness hearing," Falk said.
The organization will submit the comments to the court, which will decide whether to dismiss the case at a fairness hearing scheduled for Sep. 10.
Contact WFYI data journalist Zak Cassel at zcassel@wfyi.org
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