Roundup: Experts Condemn Trump Pseudoscientific Anti-Trans "Report"

Experts from the American Academy of Pediatrics, American Psychological Association, Fenway Health, Yale, and many other organizations have condemned Trump's report as pseudoscience.

Photo by Suzy Brooks on Unsplash

Last week, the Trump administration released a pseudoscientific literature review attacking transgender care for minors, while simultaneously rejecting medical consensus on the subject. This review, which has been published by the Robert F. Kennedy Jr-led Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), was fact checked by Erin in the Morning last week, finding that every major claim within is false and based on erroneous or long-since-debunked misinformation. Since this fact check’s publication, numerous experts have come forward expressing concern for the grave disregard of medical authority and scientific fact.

Dr. Susan J. Kressly, the President of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), is one such expert. In a public press release, she said: “The American Academy of Pediatrics is deeply alarmed by the report released by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services today on medical care for transgender and gender-diverse individuals and the process that informed its development… This report misrepresents the current medical consensus and fails to reflect the realities of pediatric care.”

Kressly goes on to add a crucial piece of information that ties into the development of this report. “AAP was not consulted in the development of this report, yet our policy and intentions behind our recommendations were cited throughout in inaccurate and misleading ways,” she said. “The report prioritizes opinions over dispassionate reviews of evidence.”

There is currently no official confirmation on who wrote the report and who peer reviewed it. Transfeminine legal scholar Florence Ashley released a thread on BlueSky analyzing the metadata of the report’s appendix, finding that MIT philosophy professor Alex Byrne is credited as the writer. Byrne has a history of posting rabid anti-trans takes on his Twitter account, including where he recently nodded towards the report’s existence, though he did not comment on his alleged status as a writer. Other individuals found credited on the report are John Koenig and Blake Sanchez, though it is unclear who these individuals are and what qualifies them to write on this subject.

Dr. Jerrica Kirkley, the co-founder and chief medical officer at the trans healthcare provider Plume, released a statement to Erin in the Morning that echoes the issues Kressly stated. “Although the review states it is not intended to serve as a clinical practice guideline or treatment recommendations, it can easily be weaponized and be misused. The anonymously authored review lacks scientific merit, as it chooses to ignore decades of evidence, well-established care guidelines and goes against the consensus of the broad medical community,” she stated.

She continued in discussing its broader implications. “It also sets a dangerous precedent of weaponizing science to fit a political narrative. Everyone deserves to be healthy and have access to medically necessary care: it should never be politicized. These types of efforts to weaponize science only serves to undermine legitimate scientific research and medical advancement, is a waste of taxpayer dollars and endangers the lives of every person seeking medical care – not just trans and gender-diverse individuals.”

Dr. Kellan Baker, the Executive Director of the LGBTQ+ healthcare provider Institute for Health Research and Policy at Whitman-Walker, issued a similar response to this report in a statement sent to Erin in the Morning. “This report is pure politics masquerading as science. Rather than following the recommendations of every major US expert medical association, including the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics, it pushes the dangerous and discredited practice of conversion therapy to try to force transgender people to change a fundamental, deeply rooted part of who they are. The ultimate goal of this report is to impose a political agenda in place of science and to insert the federal government where it does not belong—between healthcare providers and the families and patients they care for.”

These statements were not exclusive to individual healthcare executives, either. The American Psychological Association issued a response condemning this report, as have multiple leading academics with Yale University. Several more experts condemned it in an article with Science.org, while the Trans Journalist Association issued a statement with reporting guidelines for accurately describing the scientific inaccuracy of this report. Other statements condemning the report were issued by LGBTQ+ advocacy organizations such as GLAAD, Lambda Legal, and the World Professional Association on Transgender Health.

It is clear that this report does not represent an intent to pursue scientific accuracy or to protect trans youth, but rather is an ideological hit piece developed by affiliates of the Trump administration to give ad-hoc justification to growing attacks on gender affirming care. With the administration continuing its attack on marginalized people via kidnapping and holding a transgender immigrant in Guantanamo Bay and banning trans people from the military, the need for mass resistance will only grow as protective institutions fail. Activists are needed in every part of this fight, such as combating anti-trans legislation or protesting in the streets. The path ahead is clear — rather than take their attacks lying down, the public must unify and push back. Our collective future depends on it.