The brief order did not detail its legal reasoning. Justice Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas would have allowed the policy to be enforced as the lawsuit played out in lower courts.

Jesus, these two don't even pretend anymore. The prison healthcare system was (mal)functioning already without the new guidance. The new guidance will do something that an interested party says will harm them. You don't change things until you settle the question. Knowing this fuckin' court, it's just a matter of time until MAGA gets what it wants here, but Thomas and Alito already know best, apparently.

The Trump administration appealed, arguing that treatments raised security concerns and “could no longer be justified.” A divided appeals court panel left the order in place.

About 600 inmates were receiving hormone therapy in 2025, the agency said in court records. Withdrawing care would have significant effects on their bodies and mental health, their lawyers said. The government has not detailed evidence of security problems linked to hormone therapy for transgender inmates over the 30 years it has been provided, they wrote.

Archived

Hard to say what's more galling, the self assured stupidity of just flatly arguing "giving prisoners healthcare is a security risk" with no examples or even hypothetical scenarios to back it up, or the fact that there was at least one judge dumb and hateful enough to go along with it in both the appellate court and with the supremes