Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin announced in a release on Thursday that he has filed a petition seeking review by the full United States Court of Appeals for the case regarding the Save Adolescents From Experimentation Act.
“I am asking the full Eighth Circuit to hear our appeal now rather than assigning this case to a three-judge panel. Two other federal courts of appeal have allowed similar laws protecting children from experimental gender-transition procedures in Tennessee, Kentucky, and Alabama to go into effect,” Griffin said in a statement. “Those decisions demonstrate that last year’s three-judge panel decision upholding an order blocking Arkansas’s law was erroneous, and that’s why I am asking the entire court to overrule that decision.”
Also known as Act 626 of 2021, the SAFE Act prohibits doctors from providing gender-confirming hormone treatment, puberty blockers, or surgery to anyone under 18 years old or referring them to other providers for the treatment.
Gender-affirming care was voted on March 29, 2021, with a 28-7 from the Arkansas Senate to ban it. The governor at the time, Asa Hutchinson, vetoed the bill on April 5, 2021. The following day, April 6, 2021, lawmakers overrode the governor and enacted the ban.
On August 25, 2022, the United States Court of Federal Appeals ruled that Arkansas can’t enforce its ban on transgender children receiving gender-affirming medical care.
Multiple medical groups, including the American Medical Association, oppose the ban and have said the care is safe if properly administered. The Justice Department has also opposed the ban as unconstitutional.
