Court Blocks Biden-Era Rule on Gender Identity in Foster Care
In a significant victory for Texas families, the State of Texas agreed to a final judgement this week to abandon a Biden Administration rule that would have forced the Texas foster care system to mandate radical “gender identity” ideology.
The Biden rule would have created a new category of foster children – “LGBTQI+ children” and then required the State and foster care providers to affirm these children in various ways, or else lose federal funding for the state foster care program or be penalized in some way.
The Texas Attorney General’s Office challenged the Biden rule as unlawful in September 2024. In March 2025, a nationwide stay of the rule was issued by a federal district court in Tyler, Texas. With this week’s decision, the rule is entirely revoked.
A major argument by the State of Texas in court was that the Biden rule requires Texas Health and Human Services (HHS) to go beyond its statutory authority and “radically reshape” the foster care system. State agencies only have limited ability to review legislatively-imposed programs.
During the 89th Legislature, a number of bills were proposed to reform Texas’ foster care program, most of these reforms failed to pass both chambers, with only S.B. 513 by Sen. Sparks, which establishes a pilot child welfare program for rural communities, reaching Governor Abbott’s desk.