SCOTUS Affirms Ban on "Gender Affirming Care" for Trans Youth

You know, if someone comes out as transgender and wants to live as such, I have no problem with it (including everything that goes with it, including "gender-affirming care') so long as they're over the age of 18 - you know, an adult?

But under 18? That's a hard pass and thankfully SCOTUS agreed.... The Supreme Court on Wednesday issued a ruling upholding Tennessee’s ban on “gender-affirming care” for minors suffering from gender dysphoria. The ruling solidifies laws that shield children from being subjected to questionable medical treatments such as puberty blockers, hormone treatments, and surgery.

It was, as expected, a 6-3 decision with Chief Justice Roberts authoring the decision, affirming the state of Tennessee's (and by extension, about 20 other states') ban on "gender-affirming care" for trans youth, ruling the ban didn't violate the 14th Amendment's Equal Protection Clause and that it was enforced based on age and medical purpose, not gender or sex.

This is a good decision; now, I put the words "gender-affirming care" in quotation marks because, as country after country in Europe is now confirming, there is nothing affirming about what is essentially gender mutilation. 

Plus, how can a child consent to anything? I mean, an adult can consent to it as a medical necessity but unless the child has asked for their independence from their parents isn't it the parents responsibility to consent in their stead?

Fair Admissions II: UCLA Medical School Sued Over Discrimination in Admissions

NEW: UCLA medical school was sued today for discriminating against whites and Asians in admissions.

The lawsuit is based on my reporting from last year. It was filed by Students for Fair Admissions—the same group that got affirmative action outlawed nationwide.🧵 https://t.co/9mm1B6ErsN

— Aaron Sibarium (@aaronsibarium) May 8, 2025

Per Twitchy via the Free Beacon... UCLA medical school was sued for race discrimination on Thursday after whistleblowers alleged that the school holds black and Latino applicants to a lower standard than their white and Asian counterparts, the latest challenge for a beleaguered university already in the crosshairs of the Trump administration.

The complaint is based on multiple Washington Free Beacon reports about the extent of racial preferences at the medical school. It was filed by Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA), the group whose lawsuit against Harvard University resulted in the Supreme Court decision, in 2023, that outlawed affirmative action in higher education.

In a statement to the Free Beacon, SFFA president Edward Blum framed the lawsuit as a sequel to the Harvard case. 'This lawsuit sends an important message to every institution of higher education: Any school and administrator that uses race and racial proxies in admissions in defiance of the Supreme Court's ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard will be sued,' Blum said. 'University administrators in their official and personal capacities will face vigorous legal challenges if they use race and racial proxies in the admissions process.'

I could see this going pear-shaped for UCLA at least three different ways: (1) if this case makes it to SCOTUS, expect them to use the 2023 Fair Admissions case as the cudgel (and if Roberts is smart, he'll let Thomas write the opinion), (2) Title VI investigations from the Dept. of Justice (UCLA, like most universities, receives federal funding/grants and (3) both Proposition 209 and the Unruh Civil Rights Act since UCLA is part of the University of California System.

Bottom line here is that the courts are going to have to, legally speaking, beat the Fair Admissions case law into the heads of university presidents, provosts and admissions officials until John Roberts' quote is firmly entrenched into federal law to the point where no one dares touch it...

"The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race."

Period, end of story.

The Case Against Birthright Citizenship

There's a very thought-provoking feature over at the Claremont Institute on the issue of birthright citizenship and its' well worth perusing, irrespective of which side of the issue you fall on.

The Case Against Birthright Citizenship (Claremont Institute, 2018)

Founders Quotes, 11-12 March 2025

(1) Each State, in ratifying the Constitution, is considered as a sovereign body, independent of all others, and only to be bound by its own voluntary act. In this relation, then, the new Constitution will, if established, be a FEDERAL, and not a NATIONAL constitution. - James Madison, Federalist No. 39, 1788

(2) The true test is, whether the object be of a local character, and local use; or, whether it be of general benefit to the states. If it be purely local, congress cannot constitutionally appropriate money for the object. But, if the benefit be general, it matters not, whether in point of locality it be in one state, or several; whether it be of large, or of small extent. - Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution, 1833

Madison makes a salient point in #1 above; each state, while subordinate to the federal government (the Little G to the Big G) is still a sovereign body with its own powers and duties under the Constitution.

If John Marshall shaped the Supreme Court during the earliest years of America, then Joseph Story shaped its through the 1840's. As a constitutional scholar and legal jurist, Story ironically is a tie between the early years and the immediate pre-Civil War era in that he was on SCOTUS with both John Marshall - one of the great Chief Justices in American jurisprudence...and Roger Taney, one of the worst in American jurisprudence.