This week, Montana’s Department of Public Health and Human Services said that it will temporarily allow transgender residents to change the gender on their birth certificates.
The Department’s decision comes after a judge’s ruling that state health officials made “calculated violations” of his order enjoining enforcement of a state law, S.B. 280, which required for transgender individuals who wanted to change their sex on their birth certificate to undergo “gender-affirming” surgery and file a court petition.
Townhall covered last week how District Court Judge Michael G. Moses blocked the state law days after the DPHHS adopted a new rule permanently blocking residents from altering the sex on their birth certificate unless there was a “scrivener’s error” on the document.
“As some scientists have noted, ‘[h]uman sex is an observable, immutable and important biological classification,’ it is biological (and thus, genetic), binary, and immutable,” the rule stated. “The department agrees.”
Reuters reported that Moses’ decision that blocked enforcement of S.B.280 also blocked the DPHHS’ new rule because that the law “cannot be circumvented by departmental action.”
Following Moses' decision, the DPHHS said they would disregard it and continue to enforce its new rule according to the Associated Press.
In a turn of events, Politico reported this week that DPHHS said it would comply with the order despite disagreeing with it.
The order stemmed from a lawsuit filed by two transgender individuals against the state law, which was passed last year. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed the lawsuit on behalf of the two individuals.