(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today it filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for all records of communications of Assistant Secretary Rachel Levine regarding pressure put on an international group of medical experts to remove age limit guidelines on transgender procedures (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (No. 1:24-cv-02588)).
Judicial Watch filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia after Health and Human Services failed to respond to a July 3, 2024, FOIA request for:
All records of communications sent to and from HHS assistant secretary Rachel Levine regarding the removal of minimum ages for the treatment of children in the World Professional Association for Transgender Health’s (WPATH) 2022 standards of care. This includes but is not limited to communications with wpath, Walter Bouman, the World Health Organization (“WHO”), Dr. Jason Rafferty, Chase Strangio, Sarah Boateng, Amy Tishelman, and Dr. Eli Coleman. A reasonable search should include, but not be limited to, the search terms “2022 standards of care,” “SOC-8,” “minimum age,” “transgender care,” and “WPATH.”
According to a June 24, 2024, Alabama court filing in Boe v. Marshall, Levine feared that World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) draft guidelines would make it difficult for American transgender youth to obtain access to the procedures, including gender-changing surgery: “These were age 14 for cross-sex hormone treatment; age 15 for chest masculinization surgery; age 16 for breast augmentation and facial surgery; and age 17 for metoidioplasty, orchidectomy (castration), hysterectomy, and fronto-orbital remodeling.”
Psychologist Dr. James Cantor provided expert testimony on World Professional Association for Transgender Health documents as part of litigation challenging the Alabama law. Cantor testified that “Assistant Secretary Levine … influence[d] the substantive content of SOC-8 [Standards of Care], based on political goals rather than science. Specifically, Assistant Secretary Levine, through a staff member, pressured WPATH to remove recommended minimum ages for medical transition treatments from SOC-8.”
In a communication provided to the court an association member had written:
Sarah Boateng, who is Adm. Levine’s chief of staff [said the] biggest concern is the section below in the Adolescent Chapter that lists specific minimum ages for treatment, she is confident, based on the rhetoric she is hearing in DC, and from what we have already seen, that these specific listings of ages, under 18, will result in devastating legislation for trans care. She wonders if the specific ages can be taken out and perhaps an adjunct document could be created that is published or distributed in a way that is less visible than the SOC8, is the way to go….
We sent the document to Admiral Levine … She likes the SOC-8 [Standards of Care] very much but she was very concerned that having ages (mainly for surgery) will affect access to health care for trans youth and maybe adults too. Apparently the situation in the USA is terrible and she and the Biden administration worried that having ages in the document will make matters worse.
Cantor further testified:
As a result of this additional pressure, on top of that from Assistant Secretary Levine, WPATH capitulated and removed the text in violation of its own process despite the preference of its own committee members to retain the age limits.
According to a June 25, 2024, New York Times report, the eighth edition of its standards of care, released in September 2022, had no age minimums for transgender procedures.
Read the full “Standards of Care for the Health of Transgender and Gender Diverse People, Version 8”
here. Sections six and seven focus on adolescents and children.
“Biden-Harris appointee Admiral Levine, who abused power and is notorious for promoting transgender extremist policies, promoted mutilating surgeries for minors,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “It is no wonder the Biden-Harris administration wants to cover this up with unlawful secrecy. Judicial Watch’s lawsuit to expose the truth is urgently needed to protect children.
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