Mount Sinai Parents Say Trans Children’s Medical Records May Go to Trump DOJ
Parents say Mount Sinai warned them their children’s gender-affirming care records would be shared with the federal government as fears grow over a wider Trump administration dragnet.
Two parents of trans children who received gender-affirming care at Mount Sinai Health System say the hospital network called them and told them their children’s health information would be shared with the federal government. One parent, Dawn Gabriel, said she was blindsided because her 17-year-old son is no longer receiving care there after Mount Sinai informed her earlier this year that it was discontinuing gender-affirming care services for minors. Another parent, who asked not to be identified out of concern for their family’s safety, said a Mount Sinai social worker told them in a brief call that the records would be shared in response to a federal subpoena.
Mount Sinai did not tell the parents when the records would be released or provide additional details, according to the report. The hospital system declined to comment. That silence leaves families facing the threat without basic answers: what records, what deadline, what legal demand, what protections, and what happens next.
This is not a routine paperwork dispute. It is a warning to parents that private medical records tied to their trans children may move from a hospital system into federal hands. For families who trusted doctors, clinics, charts, prescriptions, and privacy rules, the call itself becomes harm. A child’s care history suddenly becomes something a parent has to imagine inside a federal file.
Gabriel said Mount Sinai told her the records would be anonymized, but she does not trust that this would fully protect her son’s privacy. Her fear is specific. Her son has a passport with the correct gender marker, and she questioned whether federal access to his private medical history could affect him when that passport has to be renewed. She also said her husband is concerned the Trump administration could come after the parents of trans children, too.
That is the human center of the story. A parent receives a call from a hospital, and suddenly a child’s medical history feels like a federal exposure point. A family that already lost access to care is now forced to wonder whether the records of that care will become part of a government demand. The harm is not only what may be produced. The harm is the fear introduced into every household with a trans child who trusted a medical system to protect them.
The confirmed subpoena in New York is tied to NYU Langone Health. The subpoena issued to NYU Langone seeks documents on patients under 18 who received treatment for gender dysphoria over the past six years, as well as personnel records of their medical providers. NYU Langone has not said whether it will comply, and a federal judge delayed any production of records sought through that subpoena until at least June 24 after pushing an emergency hearing to June 22.
The lawsuit challenging the NYU Langone subpoena was filed by New York families of trans youth and trans young adults against the U.S. Department of Justice and NYU Langone. The case challenges federal efforts to seize private health information of trans youth at NYU Langone and other New York City hospitals. The lawsuit followed NYU Langone receiving a subpoena issued under the authority of a federal grand jury in the Northern District of Texas.
The Mount Sinai facts must stay precise. Two parents say Mount Sinai representatives told them records would be shared. The lawsuit says, “upon information and belief,” the DOJ sent virtually identical federal grand jury subpoenas to other New York City health care institutions, including Mount Sinai Health System. But Karen Loewy, senior counsel for Lambda Legal, said it has not been confirmed that Mount Sinai received such a subpoena. She said her firm has heard rumors to that effect, and the class-action complaint was written broadly enough to cover people who received gender-affirming care as minors at Mount Sinai or other New York City institutions and are at risk of having their records shared.
That distinction does not make the threat smaller. It makes the uncertainty sharper. Families are not only watching a confirmed subpoena at NYU Langone. They are hearing from parents who say Mount Sinai told them records would be shared. They are seeing advocates write a lawsuit broadly enough to cover other New York City institutions. The danger does not depend on speculation. The verified record already shows federal pressure aimed at records connected to trans minors who received gender-affirming care.
The DOJ did not immediately respond to Gothamist’s request for comment and has previously declined to say why it is seeking records related to minors who received gender-affirming care. But the broader federal posture is already public. In July 2025, the Justice Department announced that it had sent more than 20 subpoenas to doctors and clinics involved in providing gender-affirming medical care to children, framing those investigations around health care fraud, false statements, and other theories.
That federal posture has already produced legal resistance beyond New York. Reuters reported this week that a federal judge allowed a lawsuit by 16 Democratic-led states and the District of Columbia to proceed against the DOJ over enforcement actions targeting gender-affirming care for trans youth. The states are challenging DOJ memos tied to Trump’s January 2025 executive order, and the judge rejected the DOJ’s argument that the memos merely set enforcement priorities.
This is where the story moves beyond one hospital call. The fight over gender-affirming care is no longer only about whether trans minors can receive care today. It is also about whether the federal government can reach backward into the private medical records of children who already received care, identify the providers who treated them, and force families to live with the fear that care itself has become a file for federal review.
Medical privacy is not a side issue here. For trans children and their parents, privacy can be the difference between safety and exposure. These records can contain diagnoses, treatment history, provider names, dates of care, insurance information, family decisions, and identifying details that families never expected to become part of a federal campaign against gender-affirming care. Even when anonymization is promised, parents are being asked to trust institutions and agencies that are leaving them without basic answers.
The chilling effect begins before any record is released. Parents may hesitate before seeking care. Providers may hesitate before documenting care. Hospitals may retreat before defending patients. Trans youth may learn that even care they received years ago can be dragged back into the present and treated as a government target. That is public harm. That is state pressure entering the exam room after the appointment is over.
The Trump administration’s attack on gender-affirming care has moved through bans, funding threats, program closures, provider intimidation, and legal pressure. A subpoena for children’s records is an escalation. It turns private care into government evidence. It turns hospitals into pressure points. It turns families into targets of uncertainty.
The record should be clear. NYU Langone received a federal grand jury subpoena seeking records related to minors who received gender-affirming care. Parents say Mount Sinai told them their children’s records would be shared with the federal government. A Mount Sinai subpoena has not been confirmed. The lawsuit seeks to block NYU Langone’s subpoena and similar subpoenas, and to stop the DOJ from obtaining this information from NYU Langone or other health care institutions.
But the moral clarity is just as clear. Trans children are not evidence lockers. Their medical records are not political trophies. Their parents should not have to wonder whether the care they fought to secure will now be used to expose their families to the same government trying to erase that care from public life.
This is how the attack on trans rights expands: first care is threatened, then clinics close, then families are told the records of care may be sent to the federal government.
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