The U.S. Supreme Court on Oct. 9, 2024. (Photo by Jane Norman/States Newsroom)
The U.S. Supreme Court will review a case that challenges the constitutionality of a 2019 Colorado law that bans conversion therapy for minors, the court announced Monday.
The case concerns a Colorado state law that bans conversation therapy, the practice of trying to change a person’s sexual orientation, such as to eliminate same-sex attraction, or gender identity. About half of U.S. states and Washington, D.C., ban the practice, and the American Medical Association opposes it. The Human Rights Campaign, a national organization that advocates equality for all LGBTQ+ people, says “every mainstream medical and mental health organization” has rejected the practice for decades and that it can lead to depression, anxiety, drug use, homelessness, and suicide, particularly for minors.
The 2019 law prohibits licensed psychiatrists and mental health care providers from “engaging in conversion therapy” with patients under 18 years old. Providers who conduct conversion therapy are subject to disciplinary action from the appropriate licensing board.
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According to The Associated Press, the court declined to review a similar challenge in 2023. While the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld the Colorado law, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has struck down local bans on conversion therapy in Florida.
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser, whose office represents the state in the case, said his office is committed to defending the law at the Supreme Court after it won at the district and appeals courts. The named defendant in the case is Patty Salazar, executive director of the Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies.
“States have long regulated medical practices to protect patients from unsafe, harmful professional conduct,” Weiser said in a statement. “Colorado’s law protecting young people from unscientific and cruel gay conversion therapy practices is humane, smart, and appropriate.”
Conservative religious law firm Alliance Defending Freedom represents the plaintiff, Kaley Chiles, a Colorado Springs counselor who argues the Colorado law violates a counselor’s right to free speech by prohibiting certain conversations related to gender and sexuality. Chiles’ petition to the Supreme Court says she is a practicing Christian who “believes that people flourish when they live consistently with God’s design, including their biological sex.” It says she views her career “as an outgrowth of her faith” and that many clients come to her because of her Christianity.
ADF CEO and President Kristen Waggoner said the government has “no business censoring private conversations between clients and counselors.”
“There is a growing consensus around the world that adolescents experiencing gender dysphoria need love and an opportunity to talk through their struggles and feelings. Colorado’s law prohibits what’s best for these children and sends a clear message: the only option for children struggling with these issues is to give them dangerous and experimental drugs and surgery that will make them lifelong patients,” Waggoner said in a statement. “We are eager to defend Kaley’s First Amendment rights and ensure that government officials may not impose their ideology on private conversations between counselors and clients.”
Colorado Senate President Pro Tempore Dafna Michaelson Jenet, a Commerce City Democrat who sponsored the law when she was in the Colorado House of Representatives, said in a statement that she is “very worried that the Supreme Court will not rule on the side of children who are being abused.”
“The state regulates standards for licensed professionals and there is plenty of evidence that forcing so-called conversion therapy on children is not only ineffective, but is harmful and can lead to suicide,” former Colorado Senate President Steve Fenberg, a Boulder Democrat who also sponsored the law, said in a statement. “We passed this law to save lives. I would hope the Supreme Court would agree that even in these polarized political times, saving children’s lives is something that we should all prioritize.”
Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson said the Supreme Court must uphold the 10th Circuit decision backing the Colorado law, which she said exists to protect LGBTQ+ children from harm.
“The Supreme Court’s decision to take up this case isn’t just about so-called ‘conversion therapy’ — it’s about whether extremists can use our courts to push their dangerous agenda, in an effort to erase LGBTQ+ people and gut protections that keep our kids safe,” Robinson said in a statement. “There’s no debate: so-called ‘conversion therapy’ is a dangerous practice, not therapy, and it has no place in our communities.”
Several court cases related to LGBTQ+ discrimination in Colorado have made their way to the nation’s highest court. That includes one in which the Supreme Court said a Colorado web designer does not have to make websites for same-sex couples, and another in which the court said a cake shop owner could deny a same-sex couple a wedding cake based on religious beliefs.
The court will hear arguments in the case during its next term, which starts in October.
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