Appeals court sides with Trump on transgender prisoners
A federal appeals court on Friday overturned a lower court ruling that barred the administration from keeping transgender female prisoners in men’s prisons.
In a complicated decision, the justices said the prisoners did not prove their claim was viable under the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel punishment.
They added that prisoners can, however, re-argue their case below, citing specific reasons why they might, individually, be at risk of harm if they were to remain in a men’s facility.
“Because we cannot uphold the district court’s finding that plaintiffs have demonstrated a likelihood of success on the merits of their Eighth Amendment claim and irreparable harm, we must vacate the preliminary injunctions and remand for further review,” wrote Judge Cornelia Pillard, an Obama appointee.
She was joined by Judge Sri Srinivasan, another Obama appointee.
Judge Raymond Randolph, appointed by George HW Bush, agreed that the lower court’s decision could not stand. But he said the entire case should have been dropped and the prisoners should have filed their complaints administratively rather than through the courts.
On Inauguration Day, President Trump issued an executive order directing the Justice Department not to place people born male in women’s prisons.
Eighteen transgender women who were about to be sent back to men’s prisons have been prosecuted.
The court said Friday that thousands of detained transgender women are in the federal system, but only a tiny fraction are in the Bureau of Prisons’ women’s facilities.
U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth, a Reagan appointee, had issued an injunction blocking a transfer from women’s prisons.
He found that prisoners were at unconstitutional risk of harm if placed in men’s facilities.
But the prisoners’ lawyers did not defend that conclusion before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, leaving the three-judge panel to reject the outright injunction.
Instead, prisoners argued that their individual situations were so risky that they deserved protection.
The appeal court said this was a fact-based issue that Judge Lamberth had not fully addressed. They sent the case back to him for further argument.
