HHS Investigates Seattle Children’s Hospital Over Harmful ‘Transgender’ Procedures

by Jeff Johnston | December 29, 2025 | Culture Government Updates

U.S. Health and Human Services General Counsel Mike Stuart announced on X that he asked the department’s Office of Inspector General to investigate Seattle Children’s Hospital for “failure to meet professional recognized standards of health care” in its treatment of children who struggle with sexual identity confusion.

Stuart stated, “Our kids’ safety is critical!”

Today I referred Seattle Children’s Hospital to @OIGatHHS for failure to meet recognized standards of health care as according to Sec Kennedy’s declaration that sex-rejecting procedures for children and
adolescents are neither safe nor effective. Our kids safety is critical!
— HHS General Counsel Mike Stuart (@HHSGCMikeStuart) December 26, 2025

The move followed HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy’s recent announcement that the department was blocking clinics and hospitals from performing transgender mutilating procedures on children.

The HHS news release announced that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services would cut all funding from hospitals that perform “sex-rejecting procedures on children under age 18.” The department further explained:

Sex-rejecting procedures on children – which include puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgical operations – expose them to irreversible damage, including infertility, impaired sexual function, diminished bone density, altered brain development, and other irreversible physiological effects.

It is unknown how many children were treated by Seattle Children’s with these horrific, body-damaging procedures since it opened in 2016.

But the HHS news release gave some national figures about children harmed by these disfiguring interventions:

Research published in 2023 estimated that from 2016 through 2020, approximately 3,700 adolescents in the U.S., aged 12 to 18 with gender dysphoria diagnoses underwent surgical interventions. This figure includes more than 3,200 youth who underwent breast or chest surgery and over 400 who had genital surgeries resulting in permanent reproductive organ alterations and compromised sexual function.

Separate research examining the period from 2017 to 2021 identified more than 120,000 children ages 6 through 17 diagnosed with gender dysphoria, with over 17,000 of these minors initiating either puberty blockers or hormonal therapy.

Those numbers may be underestimated, as hospitals and clinics across the nation are under investigation by the Department of Justice for lying about “gender dysphoria” diagnoses so that insurance companies will cover puberty blockers and hormones for children.

The DOJ stated on July 9,2025:

Today, the Department of Justice announced that it has sent more than 20 subpoenas to doctors and clinics involved in performing transgender medical procedures on children.

A declaration from Lisa Hsiao, acting director of the DOJ’s Enforcement and Affirmative Litigation Branch, explained the investigation into one such clinic at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (sadly, with the apt acronym “CHOP”).

Hsiao stated in the declaration:

From testimonies of public whistleblowers and leading national medical experts on the subject matter, the Government is aware of potential violations of federal law in connection with the provision of gender-related treatments for minors occurring at healthcare providers across the country.

She further explained that some who provide these medical interventions, including possibly CHOP, use “the incorrect diagnosis and/or billing code,” change or misrepresent a patient’s sex, or “fraudulently [make] a gender dysphoria diagnosis where patients do not meet the DSM-5 diagnostic criteria.”

Some providers failed to give informed consent to children and their parents; “actively deceived patients and parents with false claims and statements regarding the drugs’ [puberty blockers and wrong-sex hormones] effectiveness”; or “misrepresented to minor patients and their parents the risks associated with and the science claimed to support taking the drugs.”

Seattle Children’s was one of the hospitals under investigation by the DOJ, but a judge shut down the effort.

In investigating Seattle Children’s, HHS is following an executive order signed by President Donald J. Trump in January 2025, Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation.

But transgender activists and their allies have worked to stymie the administration’s efforts to safeguard troubled children.

Shortly after the order was signed, the state of Washington, joined by Oregon and Minnesota, sued to stop it from going into effect.

Washington Governor Bob Ferguson supported the lawsuit stating:

President Trump’s attempt to withhold federal funds from states that offer health care to transgender Washingtonians is unlawful and cruel. Washington is a place that supports every resident’s civil rights.

On the contrary, no one has a “civil right” to maim and mutilate themselves.

Similarly, there is no medical “civil right” to damage and destroy children’s bodies.

The Daily Citizen is grateful that the tide is turning on against transgender identification, ideology and medical interventions. We pray that HHS is successful in pursuing those who fraudulently performed these destructive procedures on children.

Related articles and resources:

Daily Citizen:

DOJ Targets Those Mutilating Children with ‘Transgender’ Drugs and Surgeries

FDA Sends Warning Letters to Companies Promoting Sex-Rejecting Breast Binders

Florida Sues Medical Groups for Promoting ‘Transgender’ Mutilation of Children

HHS Releases Report on Harms of ‘Transgender’ Medical Interventions for Minors

HHS Will Block Hospitals From Performing Sex-Rejecting, Mutilating Procedures on Children

President Trump Signs Order Protecting Children From Transgender Medical Interventions

Sign These Three Ballot Petitions to Protect Kids and Parental Rights in Colorado

Sixteen States Sue Trump Administration for Protecting Children from ‘Trans’ Procedures

Transgenderism and Minors: What Does the Research Really Show?

The WPATH Files – Transgender Interventions Are ‘Unethical Medical Experiments’