Michigan ban on ‘conversion therapy’ could be dismissed amid SCOTUS ruling, Catholic Charities suit

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled on March 31 that Colorado could not forbid therapists from helping young clients with unwanted same-sex attraction or gender dysphoria.

A lawsuit brought by several Catholic Charities affiliates in Michigan over that state’s ban on so-called “conversion therapy” could see the controversial rule dismissed in the wake of a major U.S. Supreme Court ruling on March 31.

In a near-unanimous ruling in the Chiles v. Salazar case, the high court found that Colorado violated the First Amendment by telling therapists that they could not help young people struggling with unwanted same-sex attraction and gender dysphoria.

The Colorado law represented “an egregious assault” on U.S. free speech protections, the court said, holding that the rule “[struck] at the heart of the First Amendment’s protections.”

Michigan lawsuit challenges similar law

A similar lawsuit brought by several Catholic Charities affiliates in Michigan could be decided favorably for the charity groups after the Supreme Court decision, a religious liberty attorney told EWTN News on April 1.

Luke Goodrich, vice president and senior counsel at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, said the lawsuit brought by Catholic Charities of Jackson, Lenawee, and Hillsdale counties against the state of Michigan has been on hold since January.

U.S. District Judge Jane Beckering originally ruled in favor of the Catholic charity group in its challenge of a Michigan law prohibiting “conversion therapy” for minors.

The Catholic charities offer a variety of therapy services, including for “issues of gender identity and sexuality.” Goodrich said the judge granted a temporary injunction against the Michigan law in January and then stayed the suit while awaiting the decision of the Chiles case.

Goodrich said the Supreme Court ruling in Chiles was “really helpful.”

“We think it confirms that Michigan’s law is unconstitutional,” he said. “We’re going to talk to Michigan and then we’re going to try to get a final ruling from the district court.”

Attorneys for the Catholic Charities groups emailed the Michigan government shortly after the Supreme Court ruling on March 31. “We’re going to have a phone call next week and see what they plan to do,” Goodrich said.

“When it paused the case, the court ordered the parties, within 14 days of the Chiles decision, to talk to each other and then jointly tell the court what we’re going to do,” he said.

Goodrich argued that the March 31 ruling “definitely” applies to the Michigan suit.

“The laws in Colorado and Michigan are almost verbatim identical, and Michigan itself has said that the laws and cases are nearly identical, and that whatever happens in Chiles will happen in Michigan,” he said.

The Supreme Court ruled 8-1 in the Chiles case, with Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson the lone dissent from the ruling.

She argued that the First Amendment has “far less salience” where medical regulations are concerned, though the majority opinion said that the Colorado law’s targeting of medical officials “changes nothing” regarding free speech precedent.

“The Constitution does not protect the right of some to speak freely; it protects the right of all,” the majority wrote. “It safeguards not only popular ideas; it secures, even and especially, the right to voice dissenting views.”

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