Amy Coney Barrett's Mind-Boggling Question in Supreme Court Trans Case [View all]
Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barret asked a team of ACLU lawyers advocating for trans rights if trans people had ever really been discriminated against.
The court on Wednesday held oral arguments in United States v. Skrmetti, a landmark case originating from Tennessee that could decide just how far the federal government has to go, if at all, to protect the rights of trans people. In 2023, Senate Bill 1 became law in Tennessee, banning hormone therapy and puberty blockers for minors and imposing civil penalties on doctors who don’t fall in line. Skrmetti is challenging S.B. 1, but the conservative justices don’t seem to be having any of it.
“One question I have is, at least as far as I can think of, we don’t have a history—that I know of—we don’t have a history of de jure discrimination against transgender people,” Coney Barrett said during oral arguments on Wednesday morning. “You point out in your brief that in the last three years there might have been these laws, but before that we might have had private societal discrimination.… Is there a history that I don’t know about where we have de jure discrimination?”
By de jure Coney Barrett means “federally mandated,” and she goes on to note that other minority groups have experienced that kind of discrimination, while to her knowledge trans people haven’t.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/amy-coney-barrett-mind-boggling-194718116.html
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