Minnesota sues over illegal conditions to programs that support comprehensive sexual health education

September 26, 2025 (SAINT PAUL) — Today, Attorney General Keith Ellison co-led a coalition of states in suing the federal government in response to threats from the Trump Administration to pull funding for longstanding teen reproductive and sexual health education programs from states unless educators avoid any language affirming young people’s gender identity or acknowledging a spectrum of gender identities. The 16-state coalition, plus the District of Columbia, is suing the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) over this cruel, arbitrary, and illegal effort to deny support to young people for purely political reasons. The states of Washington and Oregon are co-leading the lawsuit alongside Minnesota. 

The two programs under threat are the Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP), as well as the Title V Sexual Risk Avoidance Education (SRAE) program, both of which award grants funding sexual health education serving important public health needs, including preventing the spread of sexually transmitted infections and preventing unwanted pregnancies. Minnesota has received grant awards through both programs of a number of years, which the Minnesota Department of Health distributes to organizations providing direct sexual health education services throughout the state. The recent terms and conditions prohibiting the acknowledgment of gender identity puts $1.8 million in federal funding awarded to Minnesota at risk. 

In Minnesota, the SRAE and PREP grants are necessary to ensure that organizations can employ qualified, dedicated sexual health educators serving thousands of families and delivering curriculum that addresses teen pregnancy prevention, STI prevention, and a range of other important public health topics. The programming conducted in Minnesota using these grants provides important information to a wide variety of communities. One subgrantee provides education programming in detention centers for vulnerable teenagers. Another subgrantee provides programming in Red Lake and incorporates Ojibwe language into the programming with an adapted curriculum for grandparents, aunts, uncles, and other caretakers who are raising teenagers in need of sexual health education.   

Many states require materials for these programs have language inclusive of all young people regardless of their sex or gender identity. This practice, based on medical evidence and a commitment to the well-being of all students, is what the Trump administration calls “radical gender ideology.”

"Sexual health education should be age-appropriate, medically accurate, and it should not alienate its audience,” said Attorney General Ellison. “Unfortunately, the Trump Administration is threatening to cut funding for sexual health education in Minnesota unless that programming excludes members of the transgender community. The choice between losing funding and cutting sexual health education programs or excluding the transgender community from those programs is unacceptable, so I am challenging this unlawful action in court. Politics should not interfere with teenagers getting information they need to avoid taking risks that could impact the rest of their lives.” 

The complaint, which seeks to halt HHS before they carry out further terminations, was filed in the federal District Court of Oregon. 

The coalition asserts that HHS’s actions violate the federal Administrative Procedure Act as well as the United States Constitution. Congress created the grant programs with clear statutory requirements that are at direct odds with the Trump Administration’s baseless insistence that gender is absolute, fixed, and binary, and that any reference to transgender status or gender identity must be erased altogether. 

Forcing states to use medically unsupported, incomplete sexual health education program content violates laws adopted by Congress. The action is arbitrary and capricious under the Administrative Procedure Act. By unilaterally imposing these vague and nonsensical conditions, it also usurps Congress’ spending power and violates the separation of powers. 

Joining the lead states are Colorado, Connecticut, the District of Columbia, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Massachusetts, Maryland, Maine, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin.