NYC Mayor Adams signs order protecting gender-affirming care

Gender-affirming treatments like reassignment surgery and hormone therapy will now be protected under an executive order Mayor Adams signed Monday.

The order prohibits city resources to be used to detain people who provide lawful gender-affirming care and forbids the city from cooperating with out-of-state investigations premised on gender-affirming treatments that are legal in New York State, but unlawful in other jurisdictions.

“This executive order reaffirms the fact that hate has no place in our city and that all people deserve the right to gender-affirming care and protection against prosecution for being who they are,” Adams said in a written statement put out Monday morning. “To LGBTQ+ people across the nation feeling hurt, isolated, or threatened, we have a clear message for you: New York City has and will always be a welcoming home for you.”

Adams’ executive order is a response to dozens of recent laws outside of New York State that restrict the ability of minors to receive gender-affirming care — which can include gender reassignment surgeries, hormone replacement therapy and communication therapy.

Those procedures — especially reassignment surgery — have come under attack in many quarters, and especially in Republican-dominated states. At least 34 states have also moved to block such treatments for adults as well.

Critics of gender reassignment have argued that the procedures can cause irreversible damage and that teenagers shouldn’t be allowed to have them because they’re incapable of providing informed consent.

But proponents contend such procedures are often necessary for the mental health of transgender and non-binary people. In his announcement Monday, Adams pointed to the fact that dozens of medical associations in the U.S. have endorsed such treatments for people experiencing gender dysphoria.

Adams’ executive order is based on the premise that if a health care provider were to violate a law banning gender-affirming care in another state and then travel to New York, states could request that local jurisdictions, like New York City, detain the provider accused of the violation.

The order essentially forbids the city from doing that.

“New York City is doing what we have always done — standing up for justice and against discrimination,” Adams said.

It comes as the City Council is considering a bill along similar lines. That bill’s sponsor, Councilwoman Crystal Hudson (D-Brooklyn), said Monday that passing it into law is necessary to ensure that future administrations don’t “strip LGBTQIA+ folks of these rights.”