Federal judge temporarily blocks law for people in Idaho prisons on hormone therapy

A federal judge on Friday expanded a temporary block on an Idaho law for all incarcerated people in Idaho prisons diagnosed with gender dysphoria and receiving hormone therapy.

Judge David Nye’s revised temporary restraining order is in response to a lawsuit filed by the ACLU of Idaho on behalf of three transgender people in Idaho prisons who receive hormone therapy. They were going to lose access to their care after House Bill 668 took effect July 1 – which prohibits state funds and facilities from providing gender-affirming care.

Nye’s order doesn’t find the law valid or invalid, he wrote.

“Plaintiffs have raised serious questions going to the merits of this case and in light of the extreme time constraints,” the judge wrote.

ACLU of Idaho attorney Paul Carlos Southwick asked Nye at a Friday hearing to consider those who are not named in the lawsuit by considering the case as a class action lawsuit – a type of lawsuit filed to represent a group of people who cannot all show up in court.

Nye wrote his new order applies “only (to) the proposed class for which the named-plaintiffs seek class certification. That class is defined as: all incarcerated persons in the custody of IDOC who have a diagnosis of gender dysphoria and are receiving hormone therapy.”

Court documents show that Centurion, the health care provider for incarcerated people in Idaho, provided hormone therapy to 54 incarcerated patients before the law took effect. Between 60 to 70 patients in Idaho Department of Correction custody have been diagnosed with gender dysphoria, according to court documents.

After the law took effect, Centurion began tapering correctional residents with gender dysphoria off of their prescribed hormone therapy, Centurion lawyer Christina Hesse previously said in court.

“Suffering is currently happening and will continue to happen,” Southwick said. “The need is pressing for people to get their medication.”

Nye issued a temporary restraining order last month, blocking the law for only the plaintiffs who disclosed their names in the lawsuit.

The new law, Nye wrote, remains “in effect and enforceable for other purposes and as to other individuals not within the proposed class.”

Nye said at the hearing that he would decide later on whether to issue a preliminary injunction, which could block the law’s enforcement for the rest of the lawsuit. He said he would also decide later on whether to take this lawsuit on as a class action suit.