Idaho transgender youth gender care travel fund, assistance program launches

The Trans Youth Emergency Project is expanding into Idaho, offering families of transgender Idaho youth financial and logistical assistance to access transition-related care for minors.

Add the Words Idaho is partnering the Campaign for Southern Equality on the project, which they say has grown to 25 states and is the only project “of its scale and scope supporting families of transgender youth” affected by gender-affirming care bans.

The Trans Youth Emergency Project provides personalized patient navigation services, and emergency grants to families of $500 that are renewable every six months to assist with travel for care out of state, the groups said in a news release.

“Transgender youth, like all people, deserve the freedom to make decisions about their own bodies. Idaho politicians tried to take that away when they banned gender-affirming care for youth in 2023 – but we know our people are stronger than politics,” Nikson Mathews, policy and community advocate for Add the Words Idaho, said in a news release. “We are proud to be a part of the Trans Youth Emergency Project, which will work to ensure trans youth in Idaho are still able to get the health care they need to thrive – safely and legally.”

Since the project launched in March 2023, the Campaign for Southern Equality says it has given $500,000 in emergency grants to 1,000 families and individuals – partnering with state organizations.

The aid program is needed to support families of Idaho trans and nonbinary use who access or hope to access “necessary, proven” gender-affirming care that’s now banned in the state, Mathews told the Sun in an interview.

Idaho in 2023 banned gender-affirming care for minors through House Bill 71. The law was temporarily blocked under a federal court order. In April, the U.S. Supreme Court allowed the law to take effect for everyone besides two suing minors.

The groups behind the Idaho aid program say 26 states have passed bills to restrict or ban transgender youth access to gender-affirming care. Before 2020, no state advanced a similar law, the groups say.

About 1,000 Idaho youth are transgender, according to estimates by the University of California-Los Angeles. More than a third – 38% – of transgender youth in the U.S. live in states with bans, the Campaign for Southern Equality estimates.