Status: 🔴 Active — DOJ issuing civil and criminal subpoenas for trans youth medical records, but facing uniform court rejection (9 courts have rejected).
The Department of Justice has pursued an aggressive campaign to obtain medical records of transgender youth through administrative and criminal grand jury subpoenas, targeting hospitals and clinics nationwide. Every federal court to consider these subpoenas or related administrative demands has rejected them, finding the government acted in bad faith or with unlawful animus.
On July 9, 2025, the DOJ announced it had sent more than 20 administrative subpoenas to doctors and clinics involved in providing transgender medical procedures to minors, citing healthcare fraud, false statements, and related federal violations.
Attorney General Pam Bondi stated: “Medical professionals and organizations that mutilated children in the service of a warped ideology will be held accountable by this Department of Justice.”
Source: DOJ Press Release 25-717
Multiple federal district courts rejected the DOJ’s civil subpoenas, finding they were:
Courts that quashed DOJ subpoenas:
| Court | Case | Date |
|---|---|---|
| W.D. Wash. | QueerDoc v. DOJ | 2025 |
| D. Mass. (Boston) | In re Admin. Subpoena No. 25-1431-019 | 2025 |
| E.D. Pa. (Philadelphia) | In re Subpoena No. 25-1431-014 | 2025 |
| W.D. Wash. (Seattle) | In re Subpoena Duces Tecum No. 25-1431-016 | Sep 3, 2025 |
| W.D. Pa. (Pittsburgh) | In re 2025 UPMC Subpoena | Dec 24, 2025 |
| D. Colo. (Denver) | In re DOJ Admin. Subpoena No. 25-1431-030 | Jan 5, 2026 |
| D. Md. (Baltimore) | In re Children’s National Hospital | Jan 21, 2026 |
| D.R.I. (Providence) | In re Admin. Subpoena 25-1431-032 to RIH | May 13, 2026 |
Sources:
The first known criminal grand jury subpoena directed at a healthcare institution for offering gender-affirming care to transgender youth. Represents a major escalation from the administrative subpoenas that nine federal courts have rejected.
The subpoena was issued on May 6, 2026 by Ethan Womble, Assistant United States Attorney for the Northern District of Texas (Fort Worth Division), returnable on June 10, 2026 before the Grand Jury sitting at 501 W 10th St., Fort Worth, TX.
Womble is one of several former clerks to Judge Reed O’Connor working in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Texas, creating a direct pipeline between O’Connor’s chambers and the prosecution of gender-affirming care cases.
The government’s investigation is being coordinated through Special Agent Bradley Cooper of the FDA Office of Criminal Investigations (Kansas City Field Office), who is the designated recipient for document production.
The subpoena demands production of records spanning January 1, 2020 through May 5, 2026 under 17 separate specifications covering:
The subpoena defines “Sex-Rejecting Procedures” with language mirroring Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s anti-trans terminology:
“Any medical, surgical, pharmaceutical, or clinical intervention provided to an individual under eighteen years of age that is intended or reasonably expected to suppress, alter, or eliminate endogenous pubertal development, or to modify primary or secondary sex characteristics, for the purpose of aligning with or affirming a minor’s asserted gender identity rather than the minor’s biological sex.”
The definition explicitly covers puberty suppression, hormone administration, surgical intervention, voice modification interventions, and “other medical or clinical services that are functionally integral to, preparatory for, or undertaken in furtherance of such interventions” — language broad enough to encompass voice therapy and psychotherapy.
The definition further states: “An intervention or treatment is considered a Sex-Rejecting Procedure based on its intended purpose and expected physiological or functional effect, and not on the terminology or classification used by a health care provider or facility.”
The subpoena represents an unprecedented exercise of long-arm jurisdiction — NYU Langone is located approximately 2,000 miles from the Northern District of Texas. The choice of venue has been condemned by legal experts as an abuse of the judicial system.
Alejandra Caraballo, a Harvard Law instructor and trans legal scholar, told Erin in the Morning: “This is a blatant unlawful effort by the DOJ to intimidate providers of gender-affirming care to trans youth by engaging in judge and forum shopping. They are allegedly investigating actions by NYU that took place in New York City and yet using a grand jury in a rural Texas courtroom to send these subpoenas. There is no low that this Justice Department won’t stoop to in an effort to abuse the justice system to persecute their political enemies.”
Shannon Minter, legal director of the National Center for LGBTQ Rights, described the subpoenas as “mafia-type behavior.”
Unlike the administrative subpoenas issued under Attorney General Bondi — which were civil in nature and carried no threat of jail time — grand jury subpoenas involve a criminal investigation. This introduces the prospect of arrest and imprisonment as both a potential punishment and an enforcement mechanism for the subpoena itself. Hospitals, administrators, and individual providers who resist risk criminal contempt.
Under New York’s Shield Law, providers receiving requests for information about legally protected health activity must notify affected individuals at least 30 days before complying. NYU Langone notified patients via their online portal on May 11, 2026, and posted a public notice at nyulangone.org/public-notices/TYHPsubpoena. The hospital stated it is “evaluating our response to the subpoena.”
Whether the Shield Law can successfully block a federal grand jury subpoena in the Northern District of Texas is an untested legal question.
The DOJ asserts it is operating as a “health oversight agency” under HIPAA regulations (45 C.F.R. §§ 164.512(d) and 164.501), claiming the requested information is “necessary to further health oversight activities.” The subpoena includes a HIPAA disclosure statement claiming the request is:
The DOJ further represents that “de-identified information could not reasonably be used in its stead” — an explicit rejection of less intrusive alternatives that undermines the DOJ’s own claim of minimal intrusion.
“This is a blatant unlawful effort by the DOJ to intimidate providers of gender-affirming care to trans youth by engaging in judge and forum shopping.” — Alejandra Caraballo, Harvard Law instructor
“This is mafia-type behavior.” — Shannon Minter, NCLR Legal Director
Chief Judge James E. Boasberg of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia granted preliminary injunctions blocking the Federal Trade Commission from enforcing Civil Investigative Demands (CIDs) against WPATH (World Professional Association for Transgender Health) and the Endocrine Society — two leading medical organizations on transgender health.
The judge ruled that the FTC “likely violated the organizations’ First Amendment rights” and engaged in unlawful retaliation for their protected speech supporting gender-affirming care. He found “extensive evidence of animus” and “wafer-thin justifications” for the FTC’s demands.
The CIDs, issued in January 2026, demanded:
Judge Boasberg cited extensive evidence showing systemic targeting:
“The CID and the accompanying threat of future enforcement sit as a Sword of Damocles suspended over Plaintiff’s head.”
The judge grounded the ruling in the D.C. Circuit’s decision in Media Matters for America v. FTC, which held that Congress never intended to give an agency “license to run roughshod over a party’s First Amendment rights.”
“On this preliminary record, with extensive evidence of animus and wafer-thin justifications lacking evidentiary support, the Court finds that WPATH is likely to demonstrate a causal link between its protected speech and the FTC’s issuance of the CID.”
“The Court finds the same systemic targeting of proponents of medical treatment for gender incongruence at work here. The Society is the latest casualty in some Executive Branch agencies’ bid to investigate hospitals, medical providers, and charitable organizations that support transgender health.”
A third parallel case — American Academy of Pediatrics v. FTC — remains pending before Judge Christopher R. Cooper (D.D.C.).
Case: In re: Administrative Subpoena 25-1431-032 to Rhode Island Hospital, No. 1:26-mc-00007-MSM-AEM (D.R.I.)
Judge: Mary S. McElroy, United States District Judge
Outcome: Motion to Quash GRANTED. DOJ ENJOINED from receiving, using, or retaining any patient-identifying information produced under the subpoena.
Judge McElroy issued one of the most scathing judicial rebukes of the DOJ’s conduct to date:
1. DOJ breached duty of candor. The DOJ “misrepresented and withheld information” from both the Rhode Island court and the Northern District of Texas. A DOJ declaration to the Texas court claiming communications with RIH had ceased was “clearly misleading, if not utterly false” — an email chain showed DOJ had just reinitiated contact the day before filing.
2. Forum shopping. DOJ filed an unannounced enforcement petition in the Northern District of Texas (a venue deemed “friendly to its political positions”) while simultaneously telling RIH there was “[n]o immediate need to connect now.” The presiding Texas judge had previously branded the DOJ a “frequent forum shopper.”
3. No congressionally authorized purpose. The DOJ’s FDCA misbranding theory — that off-label prescribing of puberty blockers and hormones by licensed physicians constitutes a crime — “cannot be squared” with First Circuit precedent (Facteau, 89 F.4th 1). The court noted the DOJ’s own Office of Legal Counsel has concluded the opposite. Off-label prescribing is lawful, and Section 353(b)(2) of the FDCA expressly exempts prescription drugs dispensed by licensed practitioners.
4. Improper purpose. The subpoena was issued in bad faith as part of “the Administration’s publicly stated objective to end gender-affirming care,” citing DOJ’s own public record and Bondi’s explicit statements. Seven other federal courts found the same.
5. Fourteenth Amendment right to informational privacy. The children have a constitutional right to informational privacy in their medical records that would be violated by compelled disclosure. The court rejected DOJ’s proposed limited carveout for DCYF wards as operationally impossible — identifying which children are state wards would itself violate the privacy right being protected.
“The United States Department of Justice possesses immense prosecutorial authority and discretion. As citizens, we trust that federal prosecutors, when wielding this awesome power against a state, a company, or certainly against vulnerable children, will play fair and be honest with its counterparts and the judiciary. DOJ has proven unworthy of this trust at every point in this case.”
“This reckless disregard for the duty of candor owed to a federal court is appalling.”
“It is regrettable that this is now the case.”
The DOJ had obtained an ex parte enforcement order from Judge Reed O’Connor in the Northern District of Texas — without notice to RIH — then argued the Rhode Island court couldn’t hear the motion to quash under the collateral attack doctrine. Judge McElroy rejected this argument, finding the Child Advocate was a nonparty to the Texas proceeding with distinct interests, and the administrative subpoena (not a court order) was the proper subject of challenge.
This represents a coordinated federal campaign against transgender healthcare using prosecutorial power:
U.S. Attorney’s Office, Northern District of Texas: