Several transgender inmates, including a convicted MS-13 gang member, are lining up to join a class action lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union to prevent the Trump administration’s implementation of a new prison policy that would cut off their access to taxpayer-funded procedures.
Plaintiffs in the case Kingdom v. Trump successfully secured a preliminary injunction in June that partially blocks the enforcement of President Donald Trump’s executive order on “Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.”
The presidential mandate, in part, directed officials to stop expending federal funds on the medical modification of prisoners who identify as transgender.
However, the injunctive relief in Kingdom, which applies classwide, requires the Federal Bureau of Prisons to continue to provide “gender-affirming care” free of charge in accordance with Biden-era transgender accommodation policies.
The litigation is now complicating the rollout of a Bureau of Prisons policy revision, issued in February, that would end all complimentary in-prison access to hormonal drugs and cosmetic surgeries for gender-affirmation purposes.
If allowed to be fully implemented, the recently revised guidelines are estimated to save taxpayers well
