BOSTON—Nine Massachusetts activists were arrested at state Attorney General Andrea Campbell’s office. Administering hormones on themselves in the office on September 2, the activists accused the attorney general of failing to protect transgender patients from President Donald Trump administration’s attacks on gender affirming care.
Trump launched an executive order targeting trans gender affirming care for youth. To pressure hospitals to end access to gender-affirming care, the order instructed HHS to rescind research grants and Medicaid and Medicare coverage for gender-affirming care. The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) would go so far as to state it would refuse to fund any transition-related services.
Even though Massachusetts has a shield law that is supposed to prevent gender affirming care access for trans people from being attacked, the Massachusetts Commission on LGBTQ youth notes that the shield law doesn’t stipulate protections against withholding of federal grants.
While AG Campbell has released a statement, a legal advisory, and a lawsuit to protect gender affirming care, the trans community is already experiencing some losses. A number of hospitals and clinics, including major systems such as Baystate Health, Fenway Health, UMass Health, and Outer Cape Health Services, have already dropped gender affirming care coverage for trans people.
Outer Cape CEO Damian Archer justified the dropping of transgender affirming care to a local news outlet on the grounds that losing access to federal grants and its Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC) status would “mean closing sites, [and] stopping services.” Fenway Health’s CEO said losing its FQHC status would “limit our ability to further serve the community.”
Campbell has reportedly refused to force the hospitals to restore gender affirming care on the grounds that the hospitals are already under heightened pressure from the Trump administration and believes that Trump wants “our [healthcare] coalition [to be] dividing.”
Community disagreements with the attorney general’s approach led LGBTQ groups, unions, socialists, and peace organizations to form the “Protect Trans Care Coalition.”
Coalition member “Protect Trans Futures” issued a statement explaining their focus on Campbell, alleging her office is not doing enough to protect gender affirming care. The statement alleges that it took organizers submitting 1,200 pages of letters to organize a single meeting between Campbell, patients, and families affected by the loss of healthcare coverage.
The statement contains scathing allegations about the AG office, including refusing to meet patients and families who lost care from Fenway and Baystate, refusing to act when smaller clinics joined the aforementioned large health systems in dropping trans GAC, and even placing “responsibility to take legal action [against hospitals dropping trans GAC] on parents and families.”
The statement ends by arguing “Civil rights unenforced are civil rights denied.”
In a separate statement, Protect Trans Futures also cited examples of New York, Colorado, and California launching orders and lawsuits to restore gender-affirming care coverage.
These drops are also occurring while the legality of Trump’s threats to grants are actively being challenged in court, where a federal court in Massachusetts recently rejected the Trump administration’s justification.
Since last January, the coalition has engaged in everything from letter writing, phone zaps, private meetings with the AG’s office, confrontations on live TV, and press conferences.
The sit-in at the Campbell’s office comes after 8 months of dead ends.
Protect Trans Futures organizer Teddy Walker chanted four words as the police escorted him out:
“Act up! Fight Back!” echoing a chant performed by LGBTQ activists in the fight against AIDS in the 1980s.
Protect Trans Futures encourages everyone to sign their petition demanding that AG Campbell take measures to hold Fenway, Baystate, Outer Cape, and other health providers accountable for dropping trans GAC coverage.
No paywalls at People’s World
We hope you appreciated this article. At People’s World, we believe news and information should be free and accessible to all, but we need your help. Our journalism is free of corporate influence and paywalls because we are totally reader-supported. Only you, our readers and supporters, make this possible. If you enjoy reading People’s World and the stories we bring you, please support our work by donating or becoming a monthly sustainer today. Thank you!
CONTRIBUTOR
