Case Overview

GLAD Law, NCLR, Brown Goldstein & Levy LLP, and Rosen Bien Galvan & Grunfeld LLP represent three transgender women in a case challenging a federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) policy directed by President Trump which would override Prison Rape Elimination Act protections for vulnerable populations, including transgender women, and would terminate all medical care for gender dysphoria for incarcerated individuals. As a result of the policy, which stems from a January 20, 2025, Executive Order issued by President Trump, the plaintiffs were at imminent risk of being moved to a men’s facility and having their necessary medical care withdrawn. 

The complaint, filed January 30, 2025, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, alleges that the policies required by the new executive order violate the Administrative Procedure Act because they are arbitrary and capricious and also directly conflict with a Prison Rape Elimination Act regulation requiring prison officials to make housing determinations based on an individualized assessment of safety and security. The complaint also alleges that the policies required by the new Executive Order are unconstitutional because they discriminate based on a person’s transgender status, in violation of the Equal Protection Clause, and violate the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment. 

This case was previously called Doe v. McHenry. 

Case Updates

On March 19, the court granted a preliminary injunction for 2 additional plaintiffs that were added to the case. These women had been moved to male facilities putting them at tremendous risk. The judge ordered BOP to move them back to their women’s facilities and to resume their healthcare.

On February 24, the court extended the preliminary injunction to included the 9 additional plaintiffs.

On February 21, we filed an amended complaint adding 9 additional plaintiffs, incarcerated transgender women who had been informed they would be immediately transferred to a men’s facility and have their healthcare terminated.

On February 19, a federal judge granted a preliminary injunction in our case representing three incarcerated transgender women at risk of being transferred to a men’s facility and having their necessary medical care stopped. This blocks the Bureau of Prisons from enforcing against our clients President Trump’s first Executive Order attempting to deny the existence of transgender people, while our case against it continues. We are moving to protect as many of the transgender women in the women’s BOP units as we can and are adding anyone we hear from in the same circumstances.

Doe v. Bondi is one of the three lawsuits GLAD Law and NCLR have filed challenging sections of the Executive Order that directs the federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) to house transgender women in men’s prisons and to unlawfully withhold necessary medical care. Learn more about the other cases Moe v. Trump and Jones v. Bondi.