Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz speaks at the Department of Health and Human Services in Washington, D.C., December 18, 2025. Oz and other Trump administration officials announced proposed rules that would limit gender-sensitive care for minors. (Photo: Alex Wong/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump’s administration took significant steps Thursday in a campaign to block minors’ access to gender-affirming care across the country.
Under two proposed novel regulations from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, hospitals would not be allowed to provide gender reassignment treatment to children as a condition of participation in the Medicare and Medicaid programs, and Medicaid funds would not be allowed to be used to fund such care for minors.
Because most hospitals receive Medicare and Medicaid funding, if the regulations are finalized, they would essentially have the effect of a nationwide ban.
The announcement came a day after the House of Representatives passed a bill imposing federal criminal penalties for gender-affirming care for minors, and hours before a separate measure that would prohibit Medicaid funding for gender reassignment treatment for minors.
The proposed regulations, which will be subject to public comment in the near future, will certainly raise legal challenges.
The efforts build on Trump’s efforts executive order in January, which restricted access to gender affirming care for children.
More than half of states already have laws or policies in place to limit youth’s access to gender-affirming care, according to a nonpartisan health research organization KFF.
Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz announced the proposals along with several other health officials at a news conference at HHS headquarters in Washington.
A handful of members of the Republican Party of Congress appeared in the room. At least two Republican state attorneys general were also present – Ken Paxton of Texas and Todd Rokita of Indiana.
At a press conference, Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary said the FDA is also sending “warning letters” to 12 manufacturers and sellers of breast binders over the “illegal marketing of chest binders to children for the treatment of gender dysphoria.”
Pectoral binders are used to flatten the tissue in the chest.
Kennedy said his agency’s Office for Civil Rights is trying to “reverse the Biden administration’s attempt to include gender dysphoria in the definition of disability.”
The House passed anti-transgender bills
The proposed rules are part of the Trump administration’s broader anti-transgender agenda.
Trump signed executive orders which makes the “U.S. policy of recognizing two genders, male and female”, aimed at open blocking transgender service members from the US military and sought to ban transgender athletes competition in women’s sports teams consistent with their gender identity.
Meanwhile, efforts at the congressional level to limit youth’s access to gender-affirming care are headed to the Senate, where any legislation would likely require the support of at least 60 senators to overcome a filibuster.
House passed a certain measure on Wednesday night, 216-211, which would subject doctors to up to 10 years in prison for providing gender-affirming care to minors.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who sponsored the legislation, in her speech called its passage “a victory for children across America.” social media post Wednesday.
This is likely the Georgia Republican’s last legislative achievement resignation from Congress in early January.
Four Republicans voted against this solution: Reps. Gabe Evans from Colorado, Brian Fitzpatrick from Pennsylvania, Mike Kennedy from Utah and Mike Lawler from New York.
Three Democrats voted with the GOP in favor of the bill: Reps. Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez of Texas and Don Davis of North Carolina.
The Chamber also adopted Art measure Thursday, 215-201from Texas GOP Rep. Dan Crenshaw and Greene, which aims to ban “Medicaid funding for gender reassignment procedures for minors.”
Cuellar, Gonzalez and Davis also supported the GOP-led bill, along with fellow Democratic Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington state.
“Cruel and unconstitutional attacks”
Kelley Robinson, president Human Rights CampaignLGBTQ+ advocacy group sharply criticized the administration’s proposals, saying they would “put Donald Trump and RFK Jr. in these doctors’ offices, wresting health care decisions from families and putting them in the hands of extreme anti-LGBTQ+ people.”
Robinson also emphasized that these policies are “proposals, not binding law” and called on community members, health care providers, administrators and allies to “speak up in pushback by sharing how these proposals will be devastating to their families and the entire health community.”
So does the American Civil Liberties Union condemned the administration’s proposals and vowed to challenge the efforts in court.
Chase Strangio, co-director of the ACLU’s LGBTQ Rights and HIV Project, called the proposals “cruel and unconstitutional attacks on the rights of transgender youth and their families.”
Strangio said the proposals would “force physicians to choose between ethical obligations to patients or the threat of losing federal funding” and “uproot families who have already fled state-level prohibitions, leaving them unable to seek the care they need to survive and thrive.”
