The American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky filed a federal lawsuit Monday, alleging the state is unconstitutionally withholding gender-affirming care from incarcerated transgender Kentuckians.
Maddilyn Marcum, a transgender woman, says she has received gender-affirming hormone therapy since 2016 when the Kentucky Department of Corrections acknowledged her gender dysphoria diagnosis, which she received seven years prior. Marcum is leading the class action lawsuit that also seeks to represent 66 other people in Kentucky jails and prisons as well as any future individuals needing gender-affirming care.
“Untreated Gender Dysphoria creates a substantial risk of severe physical and psychological harm to the individual, which I have personally suffered from in my life,” Marcum said in a statement. “This case is not about a lifestyle choice, it is about ensuring that I and others receive medically accepted, appropriate healthcare for a diagnosed condition.”
According to court records, Marcum was convicted of murder in 2015 and sentenced to 40 years in prison. She is incarcerated at the Northpoint Training Center in Boyle County. Marcum alleges the ban violates her constitutional rights under the 14th and Eighth Amendment, which deals with cruel and unusual punishments.
“People who are incarcerated are already serving the sentence they received,” said William Sharp, senior staff attorney for the ACLU of Kentucky. “But that sentence does not include, nor does the Constitution permit, that they also be denied adequate healthcare simply because politicians disagree with the treatment that the medical community recognizes as appropriate and that medical providers have prescribed.”
The lawsuit is filed against two Kentucky Department of Corrections officers and the health care company that provides endocrinology services for incarcerated Kentuckians like Marcum. The state did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The new policy is the direct result of a state law passed earlier this year. The law also banned gender-affirming surgeries while incarcerated, which lawmakers and officials both said had not taken place in Kentucky.
GOP Sen. Mike Wilson from Bowling Green, who sponsored the legislation, has said the treatments, which are prescribed by a doctor, are “medically unnecessary.” The legislation itself refers to gender-affirming hormone therapy and surgeries as a “cosmetic service or elective procedure.”
“Let me be clear, Kentucky taxpayers should not be required to fund elective transgender surgeries or hormone therapies for inmates, procedures that are medically unnecessary, ideologically driven and unsupported by most Correctional Health experts,” Wilson said at an event celebrating bills that went into effect on June 27. “Our prisons are meant to provide necessary care, not serve the test sites for social activism.”
The Kentucky Psychological Association vocally opposed the bill, saying gender-affirming treatment has proven to be safe, effective and necessary.
The bill, which Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear allowed to become law without his signature, went into effect late last month, meaning no new hormone therapies can be prescribed for incarcerated transgender Kentuckians and any people who are currently receiving that treatment would be forcibly taken off treatment, although the bill does provide for a period in which the hormone’s use can be “systematically reduced.”
The lawsuit asks the court to issue an immediate restraining order and an injunction to stop enforcement of the new law.
Another new law already in effect in Kentucky, House Bill 495, undid Beshear’s executive order to limit conversion therapy and, thanks to a late addition in the Senate, bans Medicaid from paying for gender-affirming transgender treatment and procedures.
State government and politics reporting is supported in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
