Trump FTC Chair Looks for Deception in Gender-Affirming Care (2)

The Federal Trade Commission is weighing whether certain gender-affirming care practices are deceptive and need greater scrutiny, the agency’s leader said Wednesday.

The FTC will issue a public request for information next week and allow the public 60 days to respond, FTC Chair Andrew Ferguson said at a workshop on potentially deceptive trade practices among those in the gender-affirming care space.

“As chairman of the Federal Trade Commission, Congress has entrusted me with protecting citizens from deceptive acts and practices,” Ferguson said. “And one of the reasons we are here today is examine whether some of the practices in gender-affirming care are deceptive and require greater scrutiny by the FTC.”

Ferguson’s remarks come amid heightened efforts by President Donald Trump’s administration that affect the transgender community.

The FTC public request for information will come after the agency has time to consider what it learns in the Wednesday workshop, which is slated to include panels with parents, children who have encountered gender-affirming care, and medical professionals. The workshop is focusing on gender-affirming care for minors in particular.

Ferguson, a Republican who was nominated by former President Joe Biden to serve on the FTC and tapped by Trump to become chair, said at the event that in his current chairman role, he’s “not charged with passing moral judgment on anyone’s ideology, lifestyle, or medical choices.”

“I am charged, however, with protecting my fellow citizens from unfair or deceptive trade practices. And experience has taught us that the more vulnerable the population, the more likely they are to be targeted with deception,” Ferguson said.

The American Academy of Pediatrics, however, has supported access to gender-affirming care for minors.

In responding to a US Supreme Court decision over gender-affirming care in June, AAP President Susan Kressly said the treatment was “medically necessary for treating gender dysphoria and is backed by decades of peer-reviewed research, clinical experience, and scientific consensus.”

Likewise, the American Medical Association deemed treatment for gender dysphoria appropriate and medically safe for minors.

Trump during his presidency ordered the federal government to crack down on efforts to recognize people’s gender identity, issuing on his first day in office an executive action stating that US policy would only recognize two sexes.

Not long after, Trump issued another executive action stating that the US wouldn’t “fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support the so-called ‘transition’ of a child from one sex to another, and it will rigorously enforce all laws that prohibit or limit these destructive and life-altering procedures.”

Trump’s efforts sharply contrast with those of the Biden administration, which leaned on rulemaking to protect people receiving gender-affirming care.

Ferguson said he’d heard that gender-affirming care for minors was beyond the FTC’s scope, but argued that grappling with potentially deceptive practices in the space “is no different than the health claims we have addressed for many decades.”

“Refusing to investigate these health claims and the potential consumer harm to parents and children merely because one political party supports those claims as a matter of its ideology would be to politicize choice,” Ferguson said.

At the workshop event, Department of Justice Chief of Staff Chad Mizelle said the Trump administration has “also prepared draft legislation” and is “working with Congress on existing criminal laws related to female genital mutilation to more robustly protect children from chemical and surgical mutilation.”

The DOJ on Wednesday announced that it had sent over 20 subpoenas to clinics and doctors for performing transgender medical procedures. The department said its investigations include healthcare fraud and false statements.

On Thursday, Public Knowledge and LGBT Tech are holding an event to counter the claims made in the FTC workshop. It’s scheduled to feature parents, medical professionals, and former FTC commissioners Rebecca Slaughter and Alvaro Bedoya.