Sonia Sotomayor Dissents ‘In Sadness’ After SCOTUS Upholds Bans On Transgender Care For Minors As Constitutional

Ed. note: Welcome to our daily feature, Quote of the Day.

This case presents an easy question: whether SB1’s ban on certain medications, applicable only if used in a manner “inconsistent with . . . sex,” contains a sex classification. Because sex determines access to the covered medications, it clearly does. Yet the majority refuses to call a spade a spade. Instead, it obfuscates a sex classification that is plain on the face of this statute, all to avoid the mere possibility that a different court could strike down SB1, or categorical healthcare bans like it. The Court’s willingness to do so here does irrevocable damage to the Equal Protection Clause and invites legislatures to engage in discrimination by hiding blatant sex classifications in plain sight. It also authorizes, without second thought, untold harm to transgender children and the parents and families who love them. Because there is no constitutional justification for that result, I dissent.

— Justice Sonia Sotomayor, in the closing paragraph of her dissent in U.S. v. Skrmetti, where the Supreme Court held that Tennessee’s law barring gender-affirming care for transgender minors is not subject to heightened scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause. In summarizing her dissent from the bench, Sotomayor said, “[T]he majority subjects a law that plainly discriminates on the basis of sex to mere rational-basis review. By retreating from meaningful judicial review exactly where it matters most, the Court abandons transgender children and their families to political whims. In sadness, I dissent.”

Staci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Bluesky, X/Twitter, and Threads, or connect with her on LinkedIn.

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