Sara Pequeño: President’s attacks on trans rights have infected blue states

Institutions across the country are being asked to choose between their transgender patients and keeping their doors open. Hospitals have been ending their gender-affirming care programs for minors after President Donald Trump’s administration threatened federal funding for any hospital providing such treatment.

On Feb. 17, NYU Langone Health moved to end its program dedicated to gender-affirming care for trans youth, with a spokesperson saying it was due to “the current regulatory environment.”

A few days later, Gothamist reported that Mount Sinai Health System, another New York City hospital, stopped offering gender-affirming care to minors in January. The hospital has declined to comment when asked by other news outlets.

This is exactly what advocates feared would happen when Trump took office again. He is making it impossible for trans children, even in blue states, to access the care they deserve. The president is actively weaponizing the government in pursuit of a hateful anti-trans agenda that doesn’t even improve the lives of his voters.

This crackdown on gender-affirming health care is not just affecting New York. In blue states across the country, like California, Colorado and Minnesota, hospitals are capitulating to Trump out of fear that they will lose out on federal funding.

Back in December, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced that hospitals providing gender-affirming care to minors, such as puberty blockers and hormone treatments, would lose out on the Medicaid and Medicare funding necessary for them to keep their doors open.

About the same time, the House of Representatives passed a bill that would criminalize providers who offer gender-affirming care to trans youth.

Many red states previously implemented state laws to ban gender-affirming care. The Human Rights Campaign estimates that as of July, more than 40% of trans youth ages 13-17 are living in one of the 27 states with laws against this type of care on the books.

Trump and Republicans won’t be happy until all trans youth are living under these conditions.

Some families fled Republican-led states for supposed havens like New York with the hope that their children could live authentically, only for the president to extend his reach into those states. I imagine that they’re feeling betrayed, and questioning whether any place in the United States is safe for trans people under Trump’s radically transphobic agenda.

It also bears repeating that this is not an issue that will sway voters ahead of the midterm elections. It does not do anything to ease inflation or solve the housing crisis. It does not make American lives easier. All it does is make the lives of our fellow Americans more difficult.

Yet Trump finds that it is easier to make a scapegoat out of a marginalized group than it is to actually fix anything.

In the wake of unwavering attacks on trans youth over the past year, allies in the Democratic Party need to start acting with urgency. After all, this isn’t just about the loss of health care: It’s about the overreach of the federal government into states that aren’t politically aligned with Republicans.

Instead, Democratic leaders have shied away from making bold declarations of support for the trans community. Some, like California Gov. Gavin Newsom, have gone so far as to throw trans people under the bus. That strategy clearly doesn’t work.

In Congress, members of the House and Senate recently reintroduced a trans bill of rights, which seeks to codify protections for transgender people into law. It’s important that this legislation is on the books, but the writing is on the wall: There’s absolutely no way a bill like this is going to make it through Congress. Democrats must play the long game and create a plan of attack for codifying trans rights the second they can.

In New York City, this is an opportunity for Mayor Zohran Mamdani to make good on his campaign promises to invest significant amounts of money into health care for transgender New Yorkers and make the city a haven for trans people.

Mamdani must act fast – there are children who will run out of their medication next month who no longer have access to care.

It’s been clear for more than a year that Trump would rather pick on trans youth – children – than do anything that would remotely help Americans. But now that he’s threatening care and effectively chasing trans immigrants from the United States, it’s time for cisgender allies in government to speak out.

Follow USA Today columnist Sara Pequeño on Bluesky: @sarapequeno.bsky.social.