On Tuesday, Virginia Commonwealth University announced it would stop providing and researching gender-affirming care at the Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU for anyone under the age of 19.

In a post on the hospital’s website, it said the decision was made to stay within federal and state directives and was a result of “a thoughtful and thorough assessment that revealed no other viable options at this time.”

VCU staff — part of one of the largest healthcare providers in the state — were notified by email of the change, which announced they would “wind down these services,” a claim the hospital has made before.

In January, President Donald Trump signed the “Protecting Children From Chemical and Surgical Mutilation” executive order which is, at its core, designed to vilify transgender people. Since then, VCU stopped providing trans-specific care, then backtracked, allowing doctors to prescribe puberty blockers and hormone therapy, according to Axios.

Wyatt S. M. Rolla, a senior transgender rights tttorney for the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia, spoke with the Washington Blade about the negative impact VCU’s decision will have on trans children’s healthcare.

“I think a really important starting point is that gender-affirming care is legal in the state of Virginia, including for individuals under the age of 19, and there are doctors, nurses, clinicians across the state that are committed to still providing that care to patients,” Rolla said.

Rolla went on to explain that even though providing gender-affirming care for minors is legal in Virginia, this executive order has a chilling effect on hospitals and is preemptively causing institutions like VCU to stop offering it.

“The primary impact of that executive order was to threaten the disruption of federal funding to hospitals that were providing that care,” they added. “There have been multiple pieces of litigation filed to challenge that threat to disrupt grants to institutions that are providing this care, and the executive order — that provision of it — is actually enjoined by multiple federal courts right now and cannot be used as a basis to terminate federal funding.”

They continued, explaining that this is not the only method of control the Trump-Vance administration is using.

“The Trump administration is weaponizing the Department of Justice, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Federal Trade Commission, [and] other federal agencies to try to bully healthcare providers into discriminating against their patients, and that should disturb everyone, because it won’t stop at trans people.”

These other fears, Rolla explained, could encroach on broader issues of bodily autonomy and safety that Republicans deem “controversial” — especially if medical boards, which are supposed to be non-political, are affected by orders like this one.

“I mean, it is setting a really dangerous precedent for all Virginians,” Rolla said. “And I think it’s not just a question of how other hospitals in Virginia will respond regarding gender-affirming care. Tomorrow, this could be a conversation about reproductive health services or HIV treatment or other vital health care that someone has decided is politically controversial. It’s really important to recognize the threat of undermining public trust in our medical institutions and endangering the communities that they’re meant to serve by refusing to provide medical care that providers have determined is necessary.”

When asked what the ACLU of Virginia hopes children seeking gender-affirming care will know, Rolla said:

“I want those young people and their families to know that again, there are doctors, nurses, clinicians across the state that are working around the clock to make sure they are able to provide you the care that you need, and there are advocates [and] community members that are going to fight on every terrain necessary to preserve the legal ability of those health care providers to do that. So while those young people are being cynically targeted for political advantage, I want them to know that they’re not alone and that there is a deep bench of people that are fighting to have for them to access the resources they need to thrive and grow into the beautiful adults that we know they deserve to be.”

The ACLU also sent a statement condemning the actions of VCU.

Equality Virginia, He She Ze and We, Side by Side, Planned Parenthood Advocates of Virginia, the Transgender Assistance Program of Virginia, Seven Hills Family Medicine, Health Brigade, Thriving Trans Men of Color, Virginia LGBTQ+ Bar Association, the Calos Coalition, the Shenandoah LGBTQ Center, Progress Virginia, and the Campaign for Southern Equality co-signed the statement. They claim VCU’s decision is a direct result of Trump and the Republican Party’s “hateful political agenda” and has nothing to do with healthcare.

“We see the political strategy. We reject it. We’ll keep fighting for trans youth, their families, and providers who support them,” reads the statement.