The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has announced a new federal rule aimed at ending federally funded gender transition procedures on minors. The statement came a day after the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Protect Children’s Innocence Act, a bill that would criminalize gender transition procedures on minors.
In a press release, the HHS stated it would release a notice of proposed rulemaking that bars hospitals performing such surgeries on minors from Medicaid and Medicare funding. The press release also announced that HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. signed a declaration stating that such treatments are not recognized as professional standards of health care.
Also, the HHS is moving to explicitly exclude gender dysphoria as a disability, contrary to the Biden administration’s attempt to treat gender dysphoria as a disability under the Rehabilitation Act. Hence, providers and hospitals that refuse such procedures would not be in violation of the disability nondiscrimination law.
“Nearly all U.S. hospitals participate in Medicare and Medicaid and this action is designed to ensure that the U.S. government will not be in business with organizations that intentionally or unintentionally inflict permanent harm on children,” the HHS press release stated. “Sex-rejecting procedures on children—which include puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgical operations—expose them to irreversible damage, including infertility, impaired sexual function, diminished bone density, altered brain development, and other irreversible physiological effects.”
The letter also announced that warning letters are being issued to 12 manufacturers and retailers that market breast binders to children with gender dysphoria.
The move follows Trump’s January 2025 executive order that states that the federal government “will not fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support the so-called ‘transition’ of a child from one sex to another, and it will rigorously enforce all laws that prohibit or limit these destructive and life-altering procedures.”
The announcement came on Dec. 18, one day after the passing of the Protect Children’s Innocence Act. The bill passed along party lines, 216-211. Penalties of violation would include fines, up to 10 years in prison or both.
Some supporters acknowledge the bill is likely to stall in the Senate, but children’s advocates and Christian groups are applauding the Trump administrative move.
“Children experiencing gender dysphoria need love, support, and medical care rooted in biological truth—not life-altering drugs and surgeries,” said Matt Bowman, Alliance Defending Freedom senior counsel. “Alliance Defending Freedom is thankful for President Trump and Secretary Kennedy’s commitment to take decisive action to help protect children from harmful medical interventions. We’re also pleased the U.S. House took an important step today to further protect kids by passing a bill that would codify a ban on federal Medicaid dollars being spent on reckless medical experimentation on minors.”
“It’s difficult enough to be a young person in the digital age without being targeted by life-altering procedures that prey on one’s greatest insecurities and confusions,” Joy Stockbauer, policy analyst at Family Research Council’s Center for Human Dignity, said. “Let’s let kids be kids again, free from the agendas and pressures of sick adults—and let’s encourage young people to see themselves as they really are, as image bearers of the God of the universe.”
