Judge Stops ‘Bad Faith’ DOJ Probe of Hospital’s Gender Care (1)

A federal judge rejected the Justice Department’s subpoena for personally identifying data on gender-affirming care patients at Boston Children’s Hospital, finding the Trump administration’s high-priority investigation was launched “for an improper purpose, motivated only by bad faith.”

US District Judge Myong Joun in Boston granted Tuesday the top-rated pediatric hospital’s request to block the subpoena while also denying its bid to keep the litigation under seal. That meant President Donald Trump’s DOJ scored a partial win in an effort, unheard of to former prosecutors, to unmask the hospitals and doctors under investigation for potential civil or criminal liability over their treatment of transgender youth.

The ruling is the first known legal defeat in the White House initiative targeting medical providers by collecting a wide range of sensitive records of staff and patients, including children, related to gender dysphoria. Attorney General Pam Bondi in July announced that DOJ issued more than 20 subpoenas to doctors and clinics that have “mutilated children in the service of a warped ideology.”

Tuesday’s decision follows a judge unsealing last month a parallel probe of transgender services at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, which awaits a decision on that provider’s lawsuit to narrow the scope of the subpoena.

Judge Joun’s harshly worded decision argued that DOJ “failed to show proper purpose” for the subpoena, while noting that the Massachusetts constitution permits gender-affirming care.

Based on the Trump administration’s statements and policies seeking to end gender-affirming care altogether, Joun said the government hasn’t disproved that the true goal of the Boston subpoena is to abolish such treatments, rather than DOJ attorneys’ stated purpose of reviewing potential health-care billing fraud and off-label promotion.

He also took issue with the Boston subpoena’s request for an “astonishingly broad array of documents and information that are virtually unlimited in scope.”

“The Government may be correct that it need not provide probable cause for its investigations, but it cannot use its subpoena power to go on a fishing expedition,” Joun wrote.

Bloomberg Law previously reported that the department’s civil division branch chief who traditionally would have signed off on such supboenas declined to do so. She raised serious concerns about collecting children’s health data and whether it was necessary to advance the investigation.

By seeking transparency over the existence of this litigation rather than DOJ’s typical preference to stay covert early in investigations, the administration has fueled criticism that the project is more about making a public display to scare hospitals into shuttering gender care programs than building legally justifiable cases.

“Boston Children’s Hospital is grateful for the court’s ruling, which safeguards the privacy of our patients, their families, and the healthcare professionals who provide their care,” said Kristen Dattoli, a hospital spokeswoman, in a statement. “Access to gender-affirming care is a protected right under Massachusetts law, and we remain committed to providing safe, evidence-based, and compassionate care for every patient and their family.”

DOJ media representatives didn’t respond to a request for comment.

The case is In Re: Administrative Subpoena No. 25-1431-019, D. Mass., No. 1:25-mc-91324, memorandum of decision filed 9/9/25.