Supreme Court to decide whether states can ban LGBTQ conversion therapy for minors

The Supreme Court decided Monday to take up a challenge to a Colorado law banning “conversion therapy” for minors who are struggling with their sexual orientation or gender identity.

Kaley Chiles, a Christian and a licensed therapist, is arguing that the Centennial State’s ban violates her First Amendment rights to free speech, while Colorado contends it can regulate medical treatments including talking cures.

“A private conversation is speech, not conduct,” attorneys for Chiles argued in their petition to the court. “That does not change just because one participant is a licensed counselor and the other her client.”

Colorado’s ban went into effect in 2019, and 26 other states have similar restrictions on the books, as does the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.

Colorado’s law bars attempts “to change an individual’s sexual orientation or gender identity” or “to eliminate or reduce sexual or romantic attraction or feelings toward individuals of the same sex.”

“A professional’s treatment of her patients and clients is fundamentally different, for First Amendment purposes, from laypersons’ interactions with each other,” lawyers for Colorado have countered.

Motivating the law is widespread research suggesting that conversion therapy is ineffective at actually changing one’s sexual orientation. Critics also allege that it causes harm to vulnerable members of the LGBTQ community.

But Chiles, who is being represented by the Christian conservative legal advocacy group Alliance Defending Freedom, has disputed that, arguing that the widely cited studies “focused on nonconsenting minors treated with physical, aversive techniques.”

Lawyers for Chiles have argued that she often has clients who are interested in receiving her help addressing concerns about their gender identity or suppressing certain sexual attractions.

“These clients believe their lives will be more fulfilling if aligned with the teachings of their faith, and they want to achieve freedom from what they see as harmful self-perceptions and sexual behaviors,” Alliance Defending Freedom lawyers argued in court documents.

They also warn that the Colorado ban has ramifications for so-called “detransitioners,” referring to people who underwent gender reassignment surgery but wish to revert back to the gender corresponding to their birth sex.

Chiles has also argued that the Colorado ban tramples upon religious freedom.

Lower court judges, including the Denver-based 10th Circuit Court of appeals, have both upheld the Colorado law.

In the past, the Supreme Court has neglected to take up cases pertaining to conversion therapy. In late 2023, the high court declined a challenge to a Washington state law that bars licensed practitioners from practicing conversion therapy.

The case, Chiles v. Salazar, is expected to be argued in the high court’s next session, which begins Oct. 6.

This term, the Supreme Court is weighing another high-profile transgender-related case, this one challenging a Tennessee law restricting gender reassignment surgeries on minors.

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Stephen Collopy

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