On Thursday, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles (CHLA) announced the pausing of its transgender youth healthcare program, citing insurmountable pressure from the Trump administration.

In emails reviewed by The Los Angeles Times, the hospital’s Center for Trans Youth began telling its nearly 3,000 patients’ families about its upcoming closure.

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“We’re just disappointed and scared and enraged,” stated Maxine, the mother of a current patient, who declined to give her last name for fear of attacks on her son. “The challenge is how we break news to this kid who has had such a positive experience with everybody at Children’s.”

The emails state there was “no viable alternative” that would allow the hospital to continue specialized care.

“There is no doubt that this is a painful and significant change to our organization and a challenge to CHLA’s mission, vision, and values,” hospital executives wrote to staff in a Thursday morning email. The center will close on July 22, and the emails say the decision “follows a lengthy and thorough assessment of the increasingly severe impacts of federal administrative actions and proposed policies.” 

Executives have determined that continuing to operate the center would jeopardize the hospital’s ability to care for its hundreds of thousands of patients, noting the continual attacks by federal agencies, including the Department of Justice, Health and Human Services, Medicare and Medicaid Services who have been issuing numerous threats towards doctors and hospitals providing gender-affirming care for trans youth, including threats of prosecution.

“These threats are no longer theoretical,” the note said. “Taken together, the Attorney General memo, HHS review, and the recent solicitation of tips from the FBI to report hospitals and providers of GAC strongly signal this Administration’s intent to take swift and decisive action, both criminal and civil, against any entity it views as being in violation of the executive order.”

The hospital’s Trans Youth Center is among the oldest and largest programs in the country and the only facility to provide puberty blockers and other gender-affirming care for trans youth on public insurance. But because the hospital is significantly more reliant on public funding than other pediatric medical facilities in California, it is particularly vulnerable to the actions and de-funding threats of the Trump administration. The severity is exacerbated even more when taking in account that 40% of pediatric beds in Los Angeles are at this hospital.

“CHLA has a responsibility to navigate this complex and uncertain regulatory environment in a way that allows us to remain open as much as possible for as many as possible,” executives wrote. “In the end, this painful and difficult decision was driven by the need to safeguard CHLA’s ability to operate amid significant external pressures beyond our control.”

This isn’t the first time this year however, that CHLA has announced that it’ll no longer provide gender-affirming services. On February 4, CHLA declared that it would stop providing hormonal therapy to transgender people under 19 in the wake of President Trump’s executive order threatening to cut funding from hospitals treating trans patients under 19.

This decision was met with protests, as hundreds gathered outside the children’s hospital in East Hollywood. The hospital reversed its decision a few weeks later when a federal judge issued a preliminary injunction blocking Trump’s Executive order.

After that, California Attorney General Rob Bonta (D) issued a statement saying the hospital’s cancellation of gender-affirming care violated the state’s Equal Protection laws. 

“Let me be clear: California law has not changed, and hospitals and clinics have a legal obligation to provide equal access to healthcare services,” Bonta said. 

Bonta has yet to respond to this current attempt to leave thousands of transgender patients without proper healthcare. Activists say this closure sets a dangerous precedent to other hospitals being pressured to cave by the current federal administration.

“CHLA needs to be a leader in this and stand up to the Trump administration, because other hospitals are taking note of what they’re doing,” said Maebe Pudlow, a trans nonbinary activist who helped organize the February protests.

“It feels very conveniently timed when everybody’s focus is on [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] raids happening in Los Angeles,” the activist went on. “I think it’s despicable.”