Judge Grants Preliminary Injunction to Transgender Women In Suit Against Bureau of Prisons; Blocks Trump Executive Order

Case Update – February 25, 2025

On February 24, the Court granted a second TRO – that opinion is here. With the 12 people covered by these two orders, plus another five people covered by other cases or prior court orders there are now 17 women protected against transfer and who will continue to receive care. In total plaintiffs’ counsel understand there are 22 people in this position in BOP nationwide.

Case Update – February 21, 2025

On February 20, two days after receiving the Order Granting the Motion for Preliminary Injunction as to the three plaintiffs—which prevented their transfer to male facilities and ensured they could receive ongoing care—plaintiffs’ counsel learned that the Bureau of Prisons was going to proceed with transferring all of the transgender women currently in female prisons to male prisons.

If transferred, these women, some of who are post-surgery, would be at high risk of assault. On February 21, RBGG, NCLR, GLAD, and Brown Goldstein Levy filed an amended complaint to add nine additional women subject to transfer to male prisons as well as a motion for a temporary restraining order and expanded preliminary injunction. The amended complaint is here. The motion for TRO is here.

Case Update – February 19, 2025

On February 18 the Court issued a preliminary injunction that will block the Bureau of Prisons from transferring the plaintiffs to men’s prisons pending further orders of the court. The Court’s order granting the preliminary injunction is here. The New York Times reported on the judges ruling here:

A judge blocks Trump’s effort to house trans women prisoners with male inmates.

Original Post

GLAD Law, NCLR, Brown Goldstein & Levy LLP and Rosen Bien Galvan & Grunfeld LLP represent three transgender women in a case challenging a federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) policy directed by President Trump which would override Prison Rape Elimination Act protections for vulnerable populations, including transgender women, and would terminate all medical care for gender dysphoria for incarcerated individuals. As a result of the policy, which stems from a January 20, 2025, Executive Order issued by President Trump, the plaintiffs were at imminent risk of being moved to a men’s facility and having their necessary medical care withdrawn.

The complaint, filed January 30, 2025, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, alleges that the policies required by the new executive order violate the Administrative Procedure Act because they are arbitrary and capricious and also directly conflict with a Prison Rape Elimination Act regulation requiring prison officials to make housing determinations based on an individualized assessment of safety and security. The complaint also alleges that the policies required by the new Executive Order are unconstitutional because they discriminate based on a person’s transgender status, in violation of the Equal Protection Clause, and violate the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment.

A hearing on the motion took place in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on February 4, 2025, at 11am (EST) and the judge granted plaintiffs’ motion for a Temporary Restraining Order later that day. The order is here. The order reads in part:.

“Plaintiffs have straightforwardly demonstrated that irreparable harm will follow if their TRO request is denied. This is so because “a prospective violation of a constitutional right constitutes irreparable injury . . . .” Davis v. Dist. of Columbia, 158 F.3d 1342, 1346 (D.C. Cir.1998). And this is to say nothing of the substantial harms that plaintiffs have plausibly stated, through affidavit, will follow if the plaintiffs are denied their hormone therapy. See generally Ettner Aff.

Moreover, the balance of the equities and the public interest favor the plaintiffs. Even if the Court credits the Executive Order’s representation that housing biological males in female penitentiaries has some deleterious effect on privacy and security, by the defendants’ own admission, there are only about sixteen male-to-female transgender women housed in female penitentiaries, including the plaintiffs. Stover Decl. ¶ 6, Gov’s Opp’n Ex. 1, ECF No. 11-1. And the defendants have not so much as alleged that the plaintiffs in this particular suit present any threat to the female inmates housed with them, or that this threat cannot be managed locally by prison staff. Thus, the public interest in seeing the plaintiffs relocated immediately to male facilities is slight at best. And it is hard to cognize of any public interest in the immediate cessation of their hormone therapy-aside, perhaps, from whatever small sum of money the BOP may save by ceasing administration of these drugs, or the abstract interest in the enforcement of Executive Branch policy decisions. The plaintiffs’ interests, on the other hand, are not abstract at all, as discussed above. The balance of the equities therefore favors a TRO so that the litigation may run its course.

Therefore, upon consideration of the plaintiffs’ Motion [ECF No. 13] for a Temporary Restraining Order, the defendant’s Opposition [ECF No. 11] thereto, and the entire record herein, it is hereby

ORDERED that the plaintiffs’ Motion for a Temporary Restraining Order is GRANTED;

and it is further

ORDERED that the defendants are temporarily enjoined and restrained from

implementing Sections 4(a) and 4(c) of Executive Order 14168, pending further Order of this

Court; and it is further

ORDERED that, pending further Order of this Court, defendants shall maintain and

continue the plaintiffs’ housing status and medical care as they existed immediately prior to

January 20, 2025.”

Court Documents

Order re TRO & Expanded PI, 02-24-25

First Amended Complaint, 02-21-2025

MPA ISO Motion for TRO and Expanded PI, 02-21-2025