A Texas state judge blocked Wednesday night the enforcement of a directive from Republican Governor Greg Abbott calling for the investigation of parents and doctors providing medical treatment for transgender children seeking gender-affirming care, the Guardian reports.
District Judge Amy Clark Meachum order a halt to enforcement action after reviewing a motion brought by the Lambda Legal and the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of the parents of a transgender 16-year-old child who were questioned by Department of Family and Protective Services officials. One of the parents of the child is also an employee of FPS.
During the hearing, lawyers for the state told Meachum that the law doesn’t require the department to investigate every transgender child in the state; instead, it provides for an unequal enforcement where the department will only investigate cases in which it believes “abuse” has occurred, but according to Abbott’s directive, any parent or doctor providing gender-affirming care is presumed guilty of child abuse.