Think back to your teenage years. What decisions do you wish you could take back? Skipping class? Never trying out for the varsity basketball team? Your prom date?
In hindsight, those choices were harmless and had no lasting impact on our adult lives. However, teens today face far more significant decisions in the form of puberty blockers, hormone therapies and gender reassignment surgeries. These choices have irreversible consequences.
President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Jan. 28 seeking to ban federal funding for youth gender-affirming medical treatments. The order, entitled “Protecting Children From Chemical and Surgical Mutilation,” outlines that the U.S. will not “fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support” transition-related care for minors, which it defines as those under age 19.
This federal action aligns with state-level efforts such as Tennessee’s SB1 law, passed in 2024, which bans healthcare providers from providing or offering gender-affirming care for minors under the age of 18. Similarly, Florida prohibits the provision of sex–reassignment prescriptions or procedures for patients younger than 18.
I’ve spoken with Democrats who have called these restrictions transphobic. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, transphobia is discrimination against, aversion to or fear of transgender people. On the contrary, I find these restrictions are anything but transphobic. The Trump Administration is protecting anyone under 19 from making an irreparable decision before entering adulthood. It’s about protection, not discrimination.
While I support the sentiment behind Trump’s executive order, he needs to raise the age for gender-affirming care from 19 to 25 for it to be truly effective.
The need for higher age restrictions coincides directly with ongoing brain development. The prefrontal cortex, responsible for planning and decision-making, is one of the last areas of the brain to mature. It is typically not developed until a person is 25. With an age limit of 19, the brain has not reached full maturation. Therefore, young adults cannot be expected to make a rational, carefully considered decision.
If you think college students are mature enough to make these life-altering decisions, just remember the average student changes their major at least three times over the course of their university career. And adolescent years are the most vulnerable period of personality changes. All that to say, kids and teenagers don’t know what they want to do with their lives, and that’s okay. Adolescence is not about having all the answers.
And yet, transgender people have access to gender-affirming hormone therapy as young as 16 years old in states such as Vermont. On the West Coast, California law ensures that trans youth can access hormones or puberty blockers, acting as a safe haven for transgender minors seeking medical care.
Puberty blockers are medications that prevent puberty from happening. The long-term effects of puberty blockers are still being investigated, however, they have so far been proven to reduce bone density, sex hormone production and fertility.
Similarly, the side effects of hormone therapies are not well studied but have the potential to leave adolescents infertile. Why should we allow teenagers to access these drugs without understanding the long-term effects and potential risks?
Congresswoman Becca Balint frames Trump as a villain who’s stripping her district of its autonomy. “I could not be more angry right now about this executive order and Trump interfering into the lives of my constituents,” said Balint on Instagram. “Their families … are just trying to get [transgender kids] the healthcare that they need and deserve.”
Trump is safeguarding trans kids from accessing under-researched hormone therapies and irreversible puberty blockers. Meanwhile, representatives like Balint encourage gender-affirming care for young trans people, promoting harmful puberty blockers like leuprolide, triptorelin and histrelin. Experts suggest discontinuing these drugs at 12 years old, but the average cutoff is age 14.
In a world where puberty blockers and hormone therapies are making headlines, President Trump needs to revise his executive order and raise the age restriction on gender-affirming care from 19 to 25. If he fails to do so, transgender people 24 and under will fall victim to his half–baked legislation.