Trump administration finalizes rollback of transgender health care protections

The Trump's administration's Department of Health and Human Services finalized a rule on Friday that will roll back health care protections for transgender people.

The rule, established along with the Affordable Care Act, prevents health care providers from denying transgender patients health care by banning discrimination on the basis of "gender identity." When HHS announced its plans to scrap this policy, advocacy groups and lawmakers alike began criticizing the move as damaging to a vulnerable group of Americans. The new policy will reportedly allow health care providers to further lean on religious exemptions.

As The New York Times' Michael Gold pointed out, the timing is particularly noteworthy, since the announcement comes "in the middle of Pride month, on the anniversary of the Pulse nightclub shooting, during a pandemic.

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An HHS official said the move "will eliminate mass confusion that was unleashed by the Obama-era decision to redefine sex to cover a wide array of gender identities," reports Axios. The nonprofit Human Rights Campaign quickly announced a legal challenge to the rule.