photo by Alexa B Wilkinson @framed.unrest
On Tuesday, protesters gathered in front of NYU Langone to express their outrage at the hospital’s settlement with the DoJ, in which the hospital officially agreed to pay $8.5 million and permanently end all gender-affirming care for trans youth. The protest, organized by Gender Liberation Movement and ACT UP NY, was attended by around two hundred people, including a number of elected officials and actor Elliot Page.
Central to the protest were speakers who had been affected by the hospital’s cessation of their care, who gave their testimonies on the impact of that care and what it meant to lose it. “Gender-affirming care has made me irreversibly alive, and that cannot be taken away from me,” said 17 year-old Ocean Hiller in his testimony, “but I grieve for the younger trans kids who are losing safe spaces and freedom to explore their identities.”
Ocean was one of many teens who was impacted by NYU’s initial ending of gender affirming care in February. He had been receiving care from NYU Langone since October 2023, before abruptly losing access to that care in February of this year. With some assistance from his previous doctor at NYU Langone, he managed to find a new provider to keep up his prescription with minimal interruption.
Ocean was also one of numerous current and former NYU Langone patients to receive the alarming message from the hospital that the DoJ was now subpoenaing them to seize their medical records, which happened shortly after he had gotten settled with his new provider. “It was incredibly scary. I spent my last month of high school less celebrating my academic journey and instead worrying about whether my private medical records would remain mine,” said Ocean in an interview with Assigned Media.
The DoJ’s subpoena sought to seize personal records and information of all minors who received gender-affirming care since 2020 as well as information about health care providers and other staff involved in that care.
In response to the subpoena, the ACLU, NYCLU, and Lambda Legal filed a federal class-action lawsuit in order to protect the information of current and former patients of the hospital. In July, a federal district court issued a preliminary injunction blocking the release of patients’ medical records, finding that the plaintiffs had a high likelihood of succeeding in their case.
In spite of the ongoing case to protect their patients, NYU Langone capitulated to pressure from the federal government and settled with the DoJ, agreeing to permanently end gender-affirming care for minors in exchange for not disclosing their medical information.
“We believe this resolution is in the best interests of our patients and their families, protecting them as well as our providers and the institution from prolonged litigation,” said NYU Langone in a statement, “We recognize the concerns and challenges faced by patients and their families and remain committed to treating every patient with compassion, dignity, and respect.”
The statement did not address the agreement to end gender-affirming care for youth or the $8.5 million payment.
Following the settlement, the ACLU, NYCLU, and Lambda Legal released their own joint statement, saying “It’s beyond shameful that the Trump administration has strong-armed NYU and Mt. Sinai into striking a deal that betrays transgender young people in New York…Transgender young people deserve access to gender-affirming care”
At the protest, GLM had simple demands of NYU Langone: “We want them to restart care and meet with families and with an apology,” Eliel Cruz, and organizer of the protest and co-founder of Gender Liberation Movement, told Assigned Media, “Our goal is to have a community and cultural response to their decisions, so that patients who go there know that the hospital, regardless of what you’re getting care there for, may be willing to abandon your care if the federal government wants them to or if they politicize it.”
Both Eliel and Ocean stressed that the employees and providers at NYU were not the ones to blame. “Every single time we’ve done a picket at these hospitals, there have been employees who have stopped us and thanked us for protesting the place of work,” Eliel explained, “It’s not the employees that are making these decisions, it’s the higher up administrators and the leadership.”
Ocean didn’t mince words with his criticism of the hospital’s leadership, “They’re a corporation more dedicated to profit than actually serving vulnerable people.”
With more and more major hospitals acquiescing to the demands of Trump’s DoJ, the loss of care has been devastating for trans youth. “What’s happening right now is just so cruel,” Ocean lamented, “I’m angry that I’ve had to accept this cruelty as just like normal, because it’s not normal.”
Valorie Van-Dieman (they/she) is the Associate Editor of Assigned Media. @valorievandieman.bsky.social
