Supreme Court Conversion Therapy Ban Ruling: Kids Lose

March 31, 2026

Supreme Court Conversion Therapy Ban Ruling: Kids Lose

Today, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled 8-1 that Colorado's ban on conversion therapy violates the First Amendment. The decision in Chiles v. Salazar will almost certainly gut similar protections in more than 20 other states.

And the people who will pay for it are kids.

Not adults making autonomous choices about their own care. Kids — LGBTQ teenagers whose parents can now legally bring them to a therapist whose entire purpose is to convince them that who they are is a mistake. The science on what that does to young people is not ambiguous. It is devastating. And the highest court in the land just said: states can't stop it.

What the Supreme Court Actually Decided

The case was Chiles v. Salazar. Kaley Chiles, an evangelical Christian counselor in Colorado, challenged the state's law banning licensed therapists from practicing conversion therapy on minors. She argued it violated her First Amendment right to free speech.

The Court agreed — 8 to 1.

Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote the majority opinion, holding that Colorado's law "regulates the content of her speech and goes further to prescribe what views she may and may not express, discriminating on the basis of viewpoint." In other words: the state can't tell a therapist what to say in a session, even when what they're saying has been shown, repeatedly, to harm the patient.

Justice Elena Kagan wrote a concurring opinion, joined by Justice Sonia Sotomayor. They agreed with the result on narrow grounds — arguing Colorado's law was unconstitutional specifically because it suppressed one side of a debate while aiding the other. Two liberal justices, still going along.

The lone dissenter was Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson. And she was right.

"Talk therapy is a medical treatment," Jackson wrote. To allow this, she argued, "opens a dangerous can of worms. It threatens to impair states' ability to regulate the provision of medical care in any respect. It extends the Constitution into uncharted territory in an utterly irrational fashion. And it ultimately risks grave harm to Americans' health and wellbeing."

She saw exactly what this ruling does. Eight of her colleagues didn't — or didn't care.

Bottom Line: The Court chose to protect a counselor's right to say whatever she wants over a minor's right to not be psychologically harmed by a licensed professional. Those are the stakes. That's the trade the majority made.

The Science Is Not in Dispute

Let's be clear about something, because the framing around this case will try to muddy it: this isn't a debate about whether conversion therapy "works." Every major medical and mental health organization in the country — the American Psychiatric Association, the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, the American Psychological Association — has condemned conversion therapy as harmful and ineffective.

It doesn't change sexual orientation or gender identity. What it does is cause measurable, documented psychological harm.

LGBTQ young people who were subjected to conversion therapy are more than twice as likely to report attempting suicide. Research published by the Trevor Project and Williams Institute at UCLA found that LGB people who underwent conversion therapy were nearly twice as likely to attempt suicide. A Stanford University study found it's linked to greater symptoms of depression and PTSD.

The Trevor Project found that 13% of LGBTQ youth report being subjected to conversion therapy — and 83% of those say it happened before they turned 18. Not adults. Kids.

This isn't a he-said-she-said situation. The medical consensus is overwhelming. States like Colorado passed these laws because of that consensus — because licensed therapists were harming their youngest, most vulnerable patients, and the state decided it had an obligation to protect them.

The Supreme Court just said: not so fast.

Bottom Line: The science on conversion therapy isn't complicated. It hurts kids. States tried to stop that. The Court decided a therapist's speech rights matter more.

What Happens to the Other 20+ States

This ruling doesn't just affect Colorado. More than 20 states — plus the District of Columbia — have laws banning licensed therapists from practicing conversion therapy on minors. Every single one of those laws is now in legal jeopardy.

The decision in Chiles v. Salazar creates a First Amendment framework that opponents of these bans will use as a template to challenge them in court, state by state. Some will get struck down quickly. Others will survive modified versions of the law. But the landscape of protection for LGBTQ youth just got dramatically smaller — today — in one decision.

And the Alliance Defending Freedom, the conservative legal organization that argued the case before the Court, is already celebrating. Jim Campbell, their chief legal counsel, called it "a significant win for free speech, common sense, and families desperate to help their children."

Families desperate to help their children. That's the framing they're using — parents who love their kids and just want them to be "helped." But the kids don't get to consent. The kids don't get to choose the therapist. The kids are the ones who end up with the lasting psychological damage. And now the law is on the side of the people who cause it.

Bottom Line: This ruling is a blueprint. Expect legal challenges to conversion therapy bans across the country within months. The work of two decades of LGBTQ youth protection just got handed a massive setback.

Why This Is Personal

If you have a queer kid — or if you were a queer kid — this ruling just told you something specific about how the law sees you. It said that a therapist's right to tell your child they're broken is more constitutionally protected than the state's right to stop them.

And if you're not personally touched by this: you know someone who is. One in five LGBTQ youth in this country reports having been subjected to conversion therapy. These are people in your life — siblings, neighbors, students, coworkers — who carry the weight of what was done to them in a room where they were supposed to feel safe.

This should make you angry. Not in a vague, sad way — in a specific, this-is-unacceptable way. Because the damage here isn't abstract. It's measurable. It shows up in mental health statistics, in emergency rooms, in suicide attempt rates. And the Court just made it harder to stop.

FAQ: What People Are Asking About the Conversion Therapy Ruling

What is conversion therapy? Conversion therapy refers to any practice by a licensed therapist that attempts to change a person's sexual orientation or gender identity. It can include talk therapy, aversion techniques, and other interventions. Major medical organizations including the American Psychiatric Association and American Psychological Association have condemned it as harmful and ineffective.

What did the Supreme Court rule in Chiles v. Salazar? On March 31, 2026, the Supreme Court ruled 8-1 that Colorado's law banning conversion therapy on minors violated the First Amendment's free speech protections. The majority, written by Justice Neil Gorsuch, held that the law discriminated based on viewpoint by restricting what a therapist could say to a client.

Does the ruling mean conversion therapy is now legal everywhere? It means states face a much higher legal bar to ban it. The ruling creates a First Amendment framework that will be used to challenge similar bans in the more than 20 states that have them. Those laws aren't automatically struck down, but all are now legally vulnerable.

Why did Justice Jackson dissent? Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was the lone dissenter. She argued that talk therapy is a form of medical treatment, and that states have always had the power to regulate medical care. She warned the ruling "threatens to impair states' ability to regulate the provision of medical care in any respect" and would cause "grave harm to Americans' health and wellbeing."

What does the research say about conversion therapy's effects on minors? The research is consistent and damning. LGBTQ youth subjected to conversion therapy are more than twice as likely to attempt suicide. Studies link it to depression, PTSD, and lasting psychological harm. No credible research supports it as effective at changing sexual orientation or gender identity.

The Court Has Spoken. We Don't Have To Accept It.

Eight justices just told LGBTQ kids that their protection from harm is less important than a therapist's right to tell them they're broken. One justice — Ketanji Brown Jackson — said no. She was outvoted.

That's the ruling. That's the law now.

But laws aren't permanent, and courts aren't the only arena. States can find other legal pathways to limit these practices. Licensing boards can act. Insurance regulations can create barriers. Legislatures can keep fighting.

And right now, the most important thing you can do is refuse to let this fade into the news cycle. Share this story. Talk to people who don't know what conversion therapy is and what it does. Donate to organizations like the Trevor Project that are fighting for these kids every day.

Because the Supreme Court got this wrong — badly, consequentially, in ways that will hurt real children. And the only thing that changes that, eventually, is enough people refusing to let it stand.

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