The Quentin Burdick federal courthouse in Fargo. (Jeff Beach/North Dakota Monitor)
(North Dakota Monitor) – A North Dakota federal judge has ruled that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission cannot force a group of Catholic employers to administer or pay for gender-affirming medical care.
The case concerns two rules published by the federal agencies. The Department of Health and Human Services rule bars businesses that provide federally funded health programs from withholding medical care to someone just because they are transgender. Doing so would violate an anti-discrimination provision of the Affordable Care Act and Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, the rule states.
The lawsuit also challenged a similar rule published by the EEOC implementing Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which outlaws workplace discrimination for employers with more than 15 employees. The rule holds that such employers cannot refuse to cover medical services to a transgender staff member that they would otherwise cover for other employees.
The Catholic Benefits Association — which represents Catholic employers — filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in North Dakota alleging the rules will force its members to violate their religious beliefs. The association said the rules could require Catholic hospitals to perform gender-affirming surgeries or a Catholic ministry to cover an employee’s hormone replacement therapy, for example.
The Catholic church teaches that providing gender-affirming care to transgender people is immoral, the association states in its complaint.
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