Federal judge extends block on Idaho gender-affirming care ban in prisons

Protestors on April 2, 2024, dropped 48,000 handmade hearts — meant to represent LGBTQ Idahoans, in protest of anti-LGBTQ legislation — down the rotunda of the Idaho State Capitol Building. (Kyle Pfannenstiel/Idaho Capital Sun)
A federal judge extended a temporary legal block, preventing Idaho from enforcing a new law that would block people in prisons from accessing state-funded gender-affirming health care.
Judge David Nye last week extended a preliminary injunction blocking Idaho from enforcing the 2024 state law for all people in Idaho prisons diagnosed with gender dysphoria and receiving hormone therapy.
The Idaho Legislature in 2024 passed the law through House Bill 668. Nye has blocked the law from being enforced against people in Idaho prisons in response to a lawsuit brought by ACLU of Idaho.
Around 60 to 70 patients in Idaho Department of Correction custody have been diagnosed with gender dysphoria, according to documents released in the lawsuit last year.
Idaho's law 'clearly violates Idahoans' Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment by denying access to standard, life-saving health care,' ACLU of Idaho Legal Director Paul Southwick told the Idaho Capital Sun in a statement. 'Everyone deserves bodily autonomy and access to necessary medical care, regardless of their gender or incarceration status.'
The judicial blocks only last 90 days under limits by federal law. Boise State Public Radio first reported on the extended legal block.
The Idaho Attorney General's Office could not be immediately reached for comment.
Separately, a federal judge recently blocked federal prisons from enforcing an executive order by President Donald Trump that would've blocked gender-affirming care for people incarcerated in federal prison who have gender dysphoria, Bloomberg Law reported.
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