Trump administration moves to cut off transgender care for children

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services on Thursday unveiled a series of regulatory actions designed to block access to gender-affirming care for minors, building on broader Trump administration restrictions targeting transgender Americans. The sweeping proposals — the most significant moves this administration has taken so far to restrict the use of puberty blockers, hormone therapy and surgical interventions for transgender children — include cutting off federal Medicaid and Medicare funding from hospitals that provide gender-affirming care to children and prohibiting federal Medicaid dollars from being used to fund such procedures. “This is not medicine, it is malpractice,” Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said of gender-affirming procedures in a news conference on Thursday. “Sex-rejecting procedures rob children of their futures.” Thursday’s announcements would imperil access in nearly two dozen states where drug treatments and surgical procedures remain legal and covered by Medicaid, which is funded by federal and state dollars. The propos