The Biden administration has gone to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals after a federal judge blocked a new health care rule about discrimination based on gender identity.
Department of Justice attorneys last week filed a notice of appeal that is a first step in asking the Atlanta-based appeals court to overturn a preliminary injunction issued July 3 by Tampa-based U.S. District Judge William Jung.
Florida filed the lawsuit against the Department of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services on May 6, shortly after the rule was finalized.
The rule is designed to help carry out a federal law that prevents discrimination in health care programs that receive federal money. The law prevents discrimination based on “sex,” and the rule would apply that to include discrimination based on gender identity.
The rule and the lawsuit came after Florida and other Republican-controlled states in recent years have made decisions to prevent or restrict treatments for people diagnosed with gender dysphoria. That has included barring Medicaid coverage for hormone therapy and puberty blockers for minors.
Florida has contended in its lawsuit that the rule improperly seeks to override restrictions on the treatments and would threaten lost money for the state and managed-care plans that help operate state health care programs.
In issuing the preliminary injunction, Jung wrote that Florida has “shown that it faces an imminent injury,” with plaintiffs including the state Agency for Health Care Administration, which runs the Medicaid program, and the state Department of Management Services, which manages the state-employee health insurance program.
“The plaintiff agencies and the health care providers they regulate must either clearly violate Florida law, or clearly violate the new rule,” Jung wrote.
