How the recent Supreme Court ruling on trans-affirming care impacts LGBTQ+ Vermonters

Published: Jun. 23, 2025 at 10:09 PM EDT
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BURLINGTON, Vt. (WCAX) - Amid Supreme Court rulings, executive orders and efforts to restructure the federal government’s relationship to trans issues, parents of transgender kids say they’re disoriented.

“It’s a huge victory for America’s children, and it’s obviously something this administration believes strongly in -- that young minor children should not be allowed to be subjected to chemical castration and mutilation,” said White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt.

Just last week, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of a Tennessee law restricting access to puberty blockers, hormone therapy and surgeries for transgender minors.

“We’re at a point where there’s a real question about safety, there’s a real question about how we’re going to access care, the very care that young people need in order to survive,” said Dana Kaplan from Outright Vermont.

Outright Vermont wants families to know that changes at the federal level or court decisions do not override Vermont state laws, which explicitly protect transgender and LGBTQ+ people from discrimination.

“It’s not an option for us not to continue to deliver on our mission for LGBTQ young people,” said Kaplan.

However, the executive director of Vermont’s Human Rights Commission, Big Hartman, says programs that investigate gender identity discrimination with the Department of Education, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development have been defunded by the federal government. Open cases will be closed, and finished cases will no longer be processed.

“These two changes aren’t having a significant impact on our operations here in Vermont. We are going to continue to investigate,” said Hartman.

While the money runs dry, Hartman says the caseloads are piling up.

“It does feel like it’s escalating in kind of the tenor of the harassment may be fueled by some of the things that are being said at the national level. We are seeing incidents of verbal harassment being coupled with assaults, physical assaults, on children,” said Hartman.

In the face of this, Hartman adds, in the new budget, the Vermont Legislature allocated funding for two additional positions for the human rights commission to be able to take on and investigate more cases.