Transgender Care in Federal Prison

On his first day in office, President Trump signed Executive Order 14168, which directed that transgender people in federal custody be housed according to their sex at birth and that no federal money be spent on their gender-affirming care. In February 2026 the Bureau of Prisons turned that directive into Program Statement 5260.01, ending gender-affirming surgery, refusing to start inmates on hormone therapy while tapering off those already receiving it, and taking away social accommodations such as makeup and wigs. Three sets of transgender women in federal prison sued in the District of Columbia, all before Judge Royce C. Lamberth, and all won preliminary injunctions keeping their care in place. The class case, Kingdom v. Trump, reached the Supreme Court, which on October 21, 2026 refused the government's request to pause the injunction. The core legal problem the courts keep returning to is that the Bureau changed a long-standing policy without grappling with its own experience providing the very care it now calls unsafe.