Texas Court Upholds Injunctions Barring State from Investigating Families of Transgender Children

Last week, a Texas appeals court upheld injunctions blocking the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) from investigating parents of transgender children receiving gender-affirming care. 

The ruling came in two lawsuits brought by LGBTQ+ families and advocates following Gov. Greg Abbott’s 2022 directive calling for the provision of gender-affirming care to be investigated as child abuse. American Oversight had submitted amicus briefs in the lawsuits, which detailed documents that revealed that DFPS staff interpreted Abbott’s directive as a new rule under state law and in response adopted new policies, despite Abbott and DFPS having argued that the directive’s implementation did not constitute an official “rule.” 

In March 2022, Lambda Legal and the ACLU sued on behalf of the family of a DFPS employee with a transgender child who had been investigated because of Abbott’s directive, arguing that the rule was improperly adopted. A Texas judge agreed and issued an injunction blocking DFPS from further investigating the family. Abbott and DFPS appealed that ruling. 

American Oversight filed an amicus brief that November urging the Texas Supreme Court to review the public records we obtained and to uphold the injunction. Among the records cited in the brief are emails showing that in the days following Abbott’s directive DFPS employees were directed to open new investigations into families of children receiving gender-affirming care — and were told not to discuss the cases or investigations over email or text.

The second lawsuit at issue in the recent court decision was brought by Lambda Legal, the ACLU, and PFLAG, who asked the state to block DFPS investigations into Texas PFLAG families providing their children medically necessary gender-affirming care. A Texas court issued two injunctions in the case in July and September 2022, which Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, representing DFPS, appealed, arguing that the department did not change any practices or procedures in response to Abbott’s directive.

American Oversight filed an amicus brief in that lawsuit in April 2023, urging the court to consider the records we obtained and to uphold the lower court’s injunctions.

Last week’s decision to uphold the injunctions in these cases is an important rejection of a policy targeting LGBTQ+ children and their families in Texas. But similar threats have multiplied across the country in recent months and years — read more about American Oversight’s investigation into attacks on LGBTQ+ rights here.