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At least eleven jurisdictions and two territories have complied with a new demand from the Trump administration to remove mentions of gender identity and the existence of transgender and non-binary individuals from a national sex education initiative, officials stated.

The administration set a recent cutoff for removing these references, warning the withdrawal of substantial government funding. Almost every of the agreeing jurisdictions have GOP-led lawmaking bodies and predominantly Republican governors.

Court Battles and Financial Conflicts

An additional sixteen jurisdictions and Washington DC have initiated legal action challenging the administration's demand, arguing it violates Congressional authority, which created the $75m sexual health initiative, known as the PREP initiative.

All jurisdictions participating in the lawsuit are governed by Democratic governors.

In a late Monday judicial ruling, a federal judge prevented the HHS agency, which oversees the program, from cutting funding to the Democratic states if they refuse to comply.

“HHS fails to show that the new grant conditions are justified, let alone offer any reasonable explanation, other than pretext, for its decisions,” wrote Ann Aiken, a U.S. district judge in Oregon. “The department offers no proof that it made factual findings or took into account the legal goals.”

Program Goals and Federal Review

Prep seeks to educate teenagers on positive interactions and how to avoid pregnancy and the spread of sexually transmitted infections.

In the spring, the Trump administration demanded all jurisdictions receiving Prep funds to provide a version of their curriculum to the department and its subsidiary, the Administration for Children and Families, for a “medical accuracy review”.

By late summer, the administration dispatched notices to 46 states and territories, stating that, during the review, it had found “material in the curricula that deviate from the scope of the program's legal framework.”

Specifically, the administration said it had uncovered evidence of “gender ideology,” a phrase often used by rightwing groups to describe the idea that identity is a fluid social construct and that transgender individuals are real.

Specific Examples of Requested Changes

The government directed one state to remove a curriculum that stated: “Young people may identify in ways that differ from their assigned gender.”

It instructed North Carolina to delete a sentence from a educational module that stated: “People of all sexual orientations and gender identities need to know how to avoid pregnancy and STDs.”

Additionally, health instructors in numerous states could no longer be told to “show tolerance and understanding for all students, regardless of personal characteristics, including ethnicity, heritage, faith, social class, sexual orientation or gender identity,” based on the letters dispatched to jurisdictions.

Official Statements and State Responses

“Oversight is imminent,” said a federal official, interim leader of the Administration for Children and Families, in a announcement. “Government money will not be used to negatively influence of the next generation or advance harmful political doctrines.”

Multiple jurisdictions and regions confirmed they would eliminate the references or had already done so. These consist of eleven specific states, as well as the U.S. Virgin Islands and the Northern Mariana Islands.

Another pair of jurisdictions, the states, said their educational programs never contained the terminology referenced in the administration’s letters.

Effects on Adolescents and Mental Health

Collectively, these jurisdictions are home to over 120k transgender individuals between the ages of 13 and 17, based on estimates from a university department.

“If our goal is to help adolescents and give them a safe space, I’m not sure why we are stomping on the at-risk teenagers in the population,” commented Cindi Huss, who leads an organization that offers health instruction in one state.

“When the government says that there’s something incorrect about you and the educators aren’t allowed to provide information or they have to disclose your identity to family – when you know that that’s not secure – that’s horrible for mental health.”

Almost 50% of trans and non-binary youth contemplated self-harm in the past year, according to a 2024 survey from a suicide-prevention group. Educational backing for these adolescents is associated with reduced numbers of self-harm attempts, the group found.

Earlier Incidents and Ongoing Disputes

Earlier this year, the Trump administration ordered a state to cut references to transgender topics from its educational program.

When the Democratic-led state refused, the government withdrew its Prep grant, cutting about $12 million in government money and halting sex education programs in educational institutions, juvenile detention facilities and group homes for foster children.

The state agency is appealing the termination. So far, it has been unsuccessful in make up for the withdrawn money.

The government has additionally informed instructors who receive funding from two other federal sex education initiatives, the $50 million SRAE program and the $101 million TPPP initiative, that they may not teach about “gender ideology.”

An early October court order prevented the government from changing one program, while the Monday court order stops it from modifying the other program in the suing jurisdictions that sued over the initiative.

The ACF office did not provide a prompt reply to a inquiry.