The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit on 12 Aug upheld Arkansas’s Save Adolescents From Experimentation Act, which bars physicians from providing or formally referring minors for gender-transition treatments. The en banc decision in Brandt v. Griffin reverses a lower-court injunction and reinstates the nation’s first statewide ban on such care for those under 18. Writing for the majority, Judge Duane Benton relied on the Supreme Court’s June ruling in U.S. v. Skrmetti, concluding the Arkansas statute neither targets a protected class nor violates the Equal Protection Clause. The court also rejected challenges based on parental rights and the First Amendment, finding any limits on physician speech incidental to the regulation of medical conduct. The ruling allows the measure, enacted in 2021, to take immediate effect pending further appeals. Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin praised the outcome, while counsel for the families challenging the law said they are weighing an appeal to the Supreme Court. In a separate decision the same day, the Fourth Circuit revived a Title IX deliberate-indifference claim against the Appomattox County School Board brought by a Virginia student who says she was assaulted after officials told her to use a boys’ restroom. The two rulings highlight intensifying legal battles over gender identity in both health-care and education settings.