The Supreme Court as composed June 30, 2022 to present. Front row, left to right: Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., Associate Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr., and Associate Justice Elena Kagan. Back row, left to right: Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett, Associate Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, Associate Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh, and Associate Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson. (Photo Credit: Fred Schilling, The Supreme Court of the U.S.)
The U.S. Supreme Court agreed March 10 to hear a case about whether state and local governments can enforce bans on anti-LGBTQ conversion therapy for children, a discredited and harmful practice that has been banned by 23 states and D.C.
The case, which will be argued in the new term that begins in October, began in Colorado Springs, Colorado where a licensed professional counselor filed a challenge to a ban in 2022, arguing the law interferes with her ability to treat patients with “same-sex attractions or gender identity confusion” who “prioritize their faith above their feelings.”
The Supreme Court in 2023 declined to hear a challenge to conversion therapy bans out of Washington state but conservative justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Brett Kavanaugh voted in favor of taking up the case.
The Colorado therapist, Kaley Chiles, is represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, which is described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as “a legal advocacy and training group that has supported the recriminalization of sexual acts between consenting LGBTQ adults in the U.S. and criminalization abroad; has defended state-sanctioned sterilization of trans people abroad; has contended that LGBTQ people are more likely to engage in pedophilia; and claims that a “homosexual agenda” will destroy Christianity and society.”
The U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado struck down Chiles’s lawsuit in 2022. Her case was appealed to the Supreme Court from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit, which upheld the ban in 2023 on the grounds that it regulates professional conduct, not speech.
Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson released the following statement on Monday:
“The Supreme Court’s decision to take up this case isn’t just about so-called ‘conversion therapy’ – it’s about whether extremists can use our courts to push their dangerous agenda, in an effort to erase LGBTQ+ people and gut protections that keep our kids safe. There’s no debate: so-called ‘conversion therapy’ is a dangerous practice, not therapy, and it has no place in our communities. These bans exist to protect LGBTQ+ children from harm—period.
Attacks on LGBTQ+ rights are the entry point to attacks on all of our rights. The same people trying to legalize abuse under the guise of ‘therapy’ are the ones banning books, ripping away reproductive rights, and undermining our democracy. The Supreme Court must uphold the 10th Circuit decision finding that these laws are constitutional.”
HRC added, “So-called ‘conversion therapy,’ sometimes known as ‘reparative therapy,’ is a range of dangerous and discredited practices that falsely claim to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity or expression.”
The group continued, “Such practices have been rejected by every mainstream medical and mental health organization for decades, but due to continuing discrimination and societal bias against LGBTQ+ people, some practitioners continue to conduct conversion therapy. Minors are especially vulnerable, and conversion therapy can lead to depression, anxiety, drug use, homelessness and suicide.”
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