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Mississippi enacted HB1125 banning gender-affirming care for transgender minors and revoking providers' licenses

On February 28, 2023, Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves signed HB1125, the Regulate Experimental Adolescent Procedures (REAP) Act, making Mississippi the seventh state to bar minors from receiving puberty blockers, hormone therapy, or gender-transition surgery. The law, which took effect immediately, strips the medical license of any provider who furnishes such care, blocks public funds and Medicaid from covering it, and lets patients sue providers for up to 30 years. It was passed by the Republican-led Mississippi Legislature over objections from LGBTQ advocates and medical groups.

Jurisdiction
Mississippi
Location
Jackson, Mississippi

Abuses documented

Actors

On February 28, 2023, Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves signed HB1125, the Regulate Experimental Adolescent Procedures (REAP) Act, into law, making Mississippi the seventh state to prohibit gender-affirming medical care for transgender minors. The statute bars health care professionals from prescribing puberty-blocking medication or cross-sex hormone therapy and from performing gender-transition surgery on anyone under 18, and makes it unlawful to knowingly aid or abet such care. Any provider found to violate the ban has their license to practice medicine in the state revoked. The law took effect immediately upon signing. [1][2]

The measure also bars public funds and Medicaid from covering gender-transition care for minors and creates a private right of action letting patients sue providers for up to 30 years after treatment. Signing the bill at a news conference, Reeves said he acted against what he called "a dangerous movement spreading across America," and his office described the law as placing enforcement authority with the Mississippi State Board of Medical Licensure. The bill's principal author was Republican state Rep. Gene Newman, and it cleared the Republican-controlled Mississippi Legislature. [1][3]

Rather than regulating pediatric medicine on terms applied to all patients, HB1125 singles out one category of care sought by transgender youth for outright prohibition and attaches license revocation and decades-long liability to the clinicians who provide it. Medical organizations and LGBTQ advocates, including the ACLU of Mississippi, condemned the law as an attack on transgender young people and their families, while research cited by ABC News describes gender-affirming care as associated with improved mental health outcomes for transgender and nonbinary adolescents. [1][3]

Updates

2025-06-18 — Supreme Court upheld Tennessee ban in Skrmetti; Mississippi's law stands [4]

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 in United States v. Skrmetti that Tennessee's materially similar ban on gender-affirming care for minors does not violate the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause, applying rational-basis review. The decision leaves other states' laws restricting such care, including Mississippi's HB1125, standing and forecloses the primary federal equal-protection avenue for challenging them. [4][5]

Why we recorded this

Government is expected to regulate medical care on neutral terms rather than single out one group's health care for prohibition based on who they are. Mississippi enacted HB1125, the Regulate Experimental Adolescent Procedures Act, barring puberty blockers, hormone therapy, and surgery for transgender minors, revoking the licenses of providers who furnish that care and cutting off public funding for it. This archive records the measure because outlawing a category of care associated with transgender youth, and penalizing the clinicians who provide it, disadvantages people based on a protected characteristic rather than any neutral standard applied to all patients.

Sources

  1. Mississippi governor signs bill banning transgender health care for minors — NBC News primary accessed July 16, 2026
  2. Mississippi enacts ban on gender-affirming care for transgender minors — CNN primary accessed July 16, 2026
  3. Mississippi governor signs transgender health care ban for minors — ABC News secondary accessed July 16, 2026
  4. United States v. Skrmetti, No. 23-477 (June 18, 2025) — Supreme Court of the United States primary accessed July 16, 2026
  5. What are the Implications of the Skrmetti Ruling for Minors' Access to Gender Affirming Care? — KFF secondary accessed July 16, 2026

See also