Gender Affirming Care

Missouri's current moratorium on treatments like hormone therapy and puberty blockers for minors is set to expire in 2027. But Republicans and Democrats clashed over the research on gender-affirming health care.

Following hours of testimony last week, a Missouri House committee on approved bills that would cement the state's restrictions on transgender athletes and health care for transgender minors.

Gender-affirming healthcare for transgender minors and participating on sports teams that align with trans athletes' gender identity are currently prohibited in Missouri. Those bans are set to expire in 2027, unless the state legislature opts to extend them indefinitely.

Plaintiffs had argued the prohibition violates the equal protection and due process clauses of the Missouri Constitution. The state's highest court unanimously ruled that restricting gender-affirming care does not violate the rights of transgender children.

Kansas will end all access to hormone treatments and other gender-affirming care for transgender minors in January. To keep getting care for their children, some families are opting to leave the state entirely.

The proposed constitutional amendment also includes a ban on gender-affirming health care for minors, a provision opponents say violates a state law requiring amendments only cover one subject.

Studies are showing that Missouri's laws targeting gay and transgender people have already pushed LGBTQ+ residents to move — taking their tax dollars, and even businesses, elsewhere. One analysis estimates that Missouri has lost between $362 million to $879 million in household income, and that's expected to increase.

Since 2023, access to puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones has radically diminished in Missouri, thanks in part to national attention and political outcry.

The case before the Missouri Supreme Court comes after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a similar law in Tennessee that bars transgender minors from getting gender-affirming care.

GOP lawmakers placed a constitutional amendment on the 2026 ballot that would repeal Amendment 3, the abortion rights measure that Missouri voters approved last year. Except the new ballot summary didn't mention that it would ban abortion — so a Cole County judge ruled that it must be rewritten.

An appeals court ruled Tuesday that the Missouri Attorney General's Office may receive protected health information in its investigation of adolescent gender-affirming care, though it rejected the attorney general's claims of broad investigative authority.

The departing GOP official made a major splash in his short time as Missouri attorney general.