(LibertySons.org) – The State of Alabama passed the Vulnerable Child Compassion and Protection Act (V-CAP) in April 2022, prohibiting healthcare providers from prescribing medications to or performing procedures on minor children to alter their gender or delay puberty. Shortly after Governor Kay Ivey signed the law into effect, five parents brought a federal lawsuit against the state, naming Alabama’s Attorney General Steve Marshall, Governor Ivey, and others as defendants. On November 17, US District Judge Liles Burke ruled in favor of a defense motion, ordering US Assistant Health Secretary Admiral Rachel Levine to release emails so the defense could search for specified documents to support their case.
Admiral Levine became the first openly transgender four-star officer in any US Uniformed Service and the highest-ranking transgender government official. Before her appointment, she served as the Pennsylvania Secretary of Health and practiced as a pediatrician specializing in gender care for LBGTQ+ children and adolescents.
The defense and the federal Health and Human Services (HHS) Department reached an arrangement allowing nine lower-ranking HHS employees to act as document custodians, providing emails as directed by the court. Levine’s deputy assistant, Maura Calsyn, and the principal deputy assistant health secretary, Sarah Boateng, numbered among the nine. However, the defense and HHS hit an impasse over the inclusion of Admiral Levine, resulting in the motion.
The federal government argued that including Levine duplicated effort because she copied Calsyn and Baoteng on nearly all her correspondence, and they advised her on all policy decisions. The State of Alabama successfully argued that Levine’s email pool was unique, that gathering the requested documents through the requested parameters shouldn’t cause any additional burden, and that the state was not treating Levine differently than the other nine custodians.
Marshall celebrated the decision with a post on X, formerly Twitter. He described Levine as a leading force in the Biden administration’s “reckless promotion” of inappropriate gender-modification treatments for children.
~Here’s to Our Liberty!
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