photo by: Chris Conde/Journal-World

Carl Folsom III addresses the crowd at his swearing in ceremony on Dec. 2, 2022, at the Judicial and Law Enforcement Center.

A Douglas County judge on Friday issued a temporary order that would block the state of Kansas from enforcing parts of a law that would prevent minors from receiving gender-affirming care, saying that the plaintiffs had shown a reasonable probability that they would suffer irreparable harm during the pendency of the lawsuit.

Attorney General Kris Kobach on Saturday said he would appeal the ruling, calling Judge Carl Folsom’s 116-page decision “a stark example of judicial activism.”

The law, Senate Bill 63, was passed by the Kansas Legislature last year over Gov. Laura Kelly’s veto; it bans gender-affirming care such as puberty blockers and hormone therapies for minors.

The American Civil Liberties Union quickly sued on behalf of two transgender teenagers and their families, one of whom is from Douglas County. The ACLU sought the injunction to block the law from being enforced, saying that the plaintiffs were immediately harmed by enforcement of the law and would be irreparably harmed if it were allowed to remain in effect pending a final determination of the lawsuit.

In his ruling, Folsom said the plaintiffs were substantially likely to prevail on their claim that the law violates the Bill of Rights in the Kansas Constitution, which he said protects the fundamental right of parents to make medical decisions for their children.

Kobach, in a news release, accused Folsom of inventing “a new constitutional right out of whole cloth.”

“Even though the Kansas Constitution says nothing about it, the judge created a new right of parents to obtain otherwise-illegal treatments for their children,” he said in the release.

Folsom wrote that because SB 63 likely infringes on a fundamental constitutional right, the state had to show that it had a compelling government interest in SB 63 and that its actions furthered that interest in a narrowly tailored way. Folsom found that the state had failed to do so.

The temporary injunction issued by Folsom is not a final determination of the case.

This is a developing story and will be updated.