The Supreme Court on Oct. 21 declined to allow the Trump administration to immediately enforce a policy that would have curtailed transgender treatments in federal prisons.

The decision took the form of an unsigned order in Trump v. Kingdom. The court did not explain its ruling. Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissented from the order but did not explain why.

The Supreme Court’s decision is not a ruling on the merits of the prisoners’ currently pending class action. It does not decide whether the policy is lawful.

The Trump administration on Sept. 28 asked the Supreme Court to pause a nationwide injunction forcing the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) to keep providing hormone treatments and related services to inmates diagnosed with gender dysphoria.

Solicitor General D. John Sauer filed the emergency application that asked the justices to put on hold a federal district judge’s order that blocks a BOP policy that shuts down transgender surgeries, hormone treatments, and social accommodations such as makeup and wigs.

The federal government says the policy, which is known as Program Statement 5260.01, is necessary for prison security.

The lead plaintiff in the underlying class action is Alishea Sophia Kingdom, a man who identifies as female.

Judge Royce Lamberth of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia blocked the policy in June. He issued a written opinion saying that the program statement “amounts to arbitrary and capricious agency action” and that the plaintiffs were likely to succeed on the merits of their claim under the Administrative Procedure Act.

The act is the federal law that establishes the rules for how agencies make and change policies. When an agency reverses course, a court can block the action if it believes that the explanation falls short of the statute’s requirements.

Lamberth directed the BOP to keep providing hormone treatments and related accommodations to inmates who have a gender dysphoria diagnosis and to inmates who later receive one. A panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit later declined to stay Lamberth’s order.

Sauer said Lamberth’s ruling “denied prison administrators the substantial deference they are due.” If the preliminary injunction remains, it interferes with administrators’ expert judgment about how to administer federal prisons, he said.

“In nullifying BOP’s exercise of its statutorily conferred authority to adopt a policy that prison administrators have determined is necessary to maintain institutional security, the court’s order causes irreparable harm to the government and to the public,” Sauer said.

The BOP policy came after President Donald Trump’s Executive Order 14168 on Inauguration Day in 2025.

The order, which rescinded several Biden-era executive orders on preferred gender identity, states that the federal government recognizes two sexes, male and female.

It also states that “sex” is not a synonym for gender identity.

The order directs federal agencies to apply those definitions in statutes, regulations, forms, and government IDs, including passports.

It also bars federal funds from being used to promote gender ideology.

Section 4(c) of the order instructs the attorney general to revise BOP medical policy to comply with the order and ensure that no federal funds are used for any procedure, treatment, or drug “for the purpose of conforming an inmate’s appearance to that of the opposite sex.”

Attorneys for Kingdom urged the high court to leave Lamberth’s injunction intact.

The government has not demonstrated that it would be harmed “by continuing to provide the treatment that its own doctors recommend for patients,” while Kingdom and the other plaintiffs “face a significant risk of serious harm if their treatment is cut off,” the lawyers said in a brief.

As a result of the Supreme Court’s decision, the lower court’s injunction remains in force while the litigation continues.