District court blocks Texas AG's demand for documents on trans youth

(The Hill) — A Texas district court judge on Friday temporarily halted a demand from the state attorney general’s office for an LGBTQ advocacy group to hand over information related to its support of transgender children receiving gender-affirming medical care.

PFLAG National, a nonprofit group that supports LGBTQ people and their families, sued Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) late Wednesday in Travis County District Court, arguing that the demand from Paxton’s office was “a clear and unmistakable overreach.”

Paxton in a Feb. 5 civil investigative demand ordered PFLAG to provide information related to an “investigation of actual or possible violations” to Texas’s Deceptive Trade Practices Act, a state law that allows victims of false, deceptive or misleading business practices to sue for damages.

Paxton’s demand pertained to allegations of fraud “related to misrepresentations” of gender-affirming medical care, according to Wednesday’s lawsuit, and instructed PFLAG to surrender information on members with transgender adolescents in Texas, including any “contingency plans” to obtain care for their children, which is illegal under a Texas law that went into effect in September.

Paxton’s demand for the records, PFLAG said in its lawsuit, is part of the state’s “relentless campaign to persecute Texas trans youth and their loving parents.” It’s also retaliatory, according to the group, which is locked in two separate legal battles over access to gender-affirming care in Texas.

District Court Judge Maria Cantú Hexsel granted PFLAG’s request to block Paxton’s demand on Friday.

“It clearly appears to the Court that unless the Defendants are immediately restrained from abusing the Deceptive Trade Practices Act by enforcing or otherwise requiring PFLAG to respond to the Civil Investigative Demand and Notice of Demand for Sworn Written Statement, immediate and irreparable injury, loss, or damage will result to PFLAG and its members from the Defendants’ wrongful actions,” Hexsel wrote in the four-page order.

Hexsel, whose August order blocking Texas from enforcing its ban on gender-affirming health care for transgender minors was swiftly overturned by the state Supreme Court, additionally ordered Paxton to appear at a hearing slated for March 25 in Travis County “to show cause, if any there be, why a temporary injunction should not be issued.”

The four legal groups representing PFLAG in court — Transgender Law Center, Lambda Legal, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the ACLU of Texas — celebrated Hexsel’s order in a joint statement on Friday.

“We’re grateful that the Court saw the harm the Attorney General’s Office’s intrusive demands posed for PFLAG National and its Texas members — and is protecting them from having to respond while we continue to litigate the legality of the office’s requests,” the groups said. 

“We now will return to court to seek an extended and ultimately permanent block so that PFLAG can continue supporting its Texas members with transgender youth in doing what all loving parents do: supporting and caring for their children,” they said.

Paxton’s office did not immediately return a request for comment. In a statement on Thursday, Paxton said his office is committed to holding organizations that violate Texas law accountable.