This week, Donald Trump signed a slew of executive orders designed to make it difficult for transgender people to participate in public life with safety and dignity. Two of them make good on the president’s promise to prioritize the targeting of transgender children, and together they attempt to dissolve the support structures that help trans kids thrive.
The first will make it harder for minors to access gender-affirming care: Federal insurance programs like Medicaid and the health plans of federal employees will no longer cover treatments like puberty blockers and hormone therapy for people under the age of 19. Any medical institutions that receive federal grants for research or education will have to stop providing this type of care to transgender kids and teenagers, too.
The second executive order will end federal funding for schools that support transgender students. This could include putting trans subject matter in lesson plans, having policies that ensure teachers use trans kids’ correct pronouns, or allowing them to use bathrooms aligned with their gender identities. It directs the U.S. attorney general to work with state attorneys general and local district attorneys to investigate and prosecute teachers who affirm trans students’ identities under laws that prohibit the sexual exploitation of children and the practice of medicine without a license.
It remains to be seen whether these orders will hold up in court—and, if they do, what impact they might have state by state and institution by institution. There are good legal arguments against them on the grounds of equal protection—especially since the first executive order will not halt insurance coverage of puberty blockers and hormones for cisgender children—and advocates say the Department of Education cannot dictate school curriculum.
But however the logistics shake out, the executive orders will have an immediate chilling effect on medical professionals and educators, who are now grappling with the knowledge that helping trans kids could lead to their own prosecution. The Trump administration is successfully attempting to make it illegal or unsustainable to be a supportive adult in a transgender child’s life.
The trans kids who will be affected by this week’s directives are likely the lucky ones in America right now. They either live in states where pediatric gender-affirming care is legal, or they have the resources to travel across state lines to get it. They have supportive parents or guardians who have provided the required consent for their medical treatment. Their schools allow them to live full, integrated lives, and their teachers discourage bullying by setting a standard of affirmation for trans students. Even with all the hardships trans kids face in a moment of nationwide transphobic backlash, these are the ones with the best foundations for happy, healthy lives.
Many trans children across the country don’t have that kind of support. It’s hard to even put numbers to the impact that a network of caring adults and peers can have on a child’s life, but researchers have tried. Studies have shown that acceptance from parents, teachers, health care professionals, and classmates are all associated with lower rates of suicide attempts among transgender youth. Other research has found an association between access to gender-affirming medical treatments in childhood or adolescence and a lower risk of suicidality and improved mental health through adulthood.
Even before Trump took office, red states were investigating parents for child abuse for providing their kids with the medical treatment they need to feel comfortable and whole in their bodies. With these new orders, the places where trans youth have a chance of growing up with the same support and resources as their cisgender peers are likely to dwindle further. The GOP’s vision for the country, which Trump is now carrying out, is one in which adults across the country who want to help the trans kids in their lives thrive will have to break the law to do so. We’ve already seen how that goes with abortion providers.
Until a few years ago, the prospects for transgender youth with supportive parents were looking up. There was a glimpse of a brighter future ahead—a hope that many trans kids wouldn’t have to grow up with the childhood trauma that was the norm for trans people who came of age in earlier decades. Instead, they could get medical treatments that prevented gender dysphoria, experience validation from trusted adults, and engage in social life as their full selves.
That future is slipping away. Teachers who went into the profession to foster the development of curious, empathetic, confident young people will now find themselves forcibly aligned with classroom bullies. Parents who would do anything to give their kids the best shot at a stable and joyful life will now be helpless in the face of the law, made to witness their precious children suffer preventable distress and possibly undergo the excruciating process of medical detransition. It’s hard enough to be a trans kid, even with the full support of adults in your life. The Trump administration is dead set on making it harder.
