NYU Langone Pays DOJ $8.5 Million, Formally Ends Transgender Care for Minors

NYU Langone Health reached a settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice on Friday, September 18, agreeing to pay $8.5 million and permanently end gender-affirming care for minors, according to the DOJ's announcement and confirmed by CBS News.

The hospital had already halted its Transgender Youth Health Program in February 2026, citing what it called the "current regulatory environment," according to Washington Square News. Friday's deal puts a legal and financial seal on that decision rather than triggering an immediate change for current patients.

How We Got Here

The settlement caps an investigation that stretches back to at least June 2025, when the DOJ first began demanding information from NYU Langone about its gender-affirming care program, according to Washington Square News. In May 2026, a federal prosecutor issued a grand jury subpoena demanding the hospital identify every minor patient who received such care since 2020.

A group of transgender patients sued to block that subpoena in June 2026. A Manhattan federal judge granted a temporary injunction on June 24, and the DOJ's appeal of that ruling is still pending before the U.S. Court of Appeals, according to Washington Square News and CBS News. Under the settlement, NYU Langone will not have to turn over the patient records the subpoena originally sought.

What Each Side Says

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the deal reflects the DOJ "fighting to protect our nation's children," per the New York Post. Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate said the department appreciates that "some of the nation's largest and most prestigious hospital systems have agreed to cease harming minors under the guise of 'gender-affirming care,'" and warned that providers who don't settle "will be prosecuted to the fullest extent possible."

The DOJ's underlying legal theory rests on the False Claims Act, not a direct ban, according to ICLG. The department alleges hospitals used fraudulent billing and diagnosis codes to bill federal health programs and insurers for the care. An April 2025 memo from Attorney General Pam Bondi had warned providers that falsely billing for "the chemical or surgical mutilation of a child" triggers treble damages under that law, ICLG reported.

NYU Langone spokesman Steve Ritea said the hospital "has not entered into this settlement because of any wrongdoing and has affirmatively denied any wrongdoing or liability in the agreement." The hospital says the deal was about shielding patient privacy and avoiding prolonged litigation, not admitting fault. No court has made a finding of liability against NYU Langone.

The Pushback

Advocates argue the settlement amounts to the federal government strong-arming a hospital into abandoning medically necessary treatment without any legal finding that the care was fraudulent or harmful. Shannon Minter, legal director of the National Center for LGBTQ Rights, told Newsday the campaign "is not law enforcement, it is intimidation," arguing the administration is "threatening hospitals until they drop lawful care it opposes politically."

Lambda Legal, the New York Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU, who represented patients in the underlying lawsuit, issued a joint statement noting that because of their injunction, no patient information was actually disclosed to the DOJ in either the NYU or Mount Sinai settlements. They called the deal "another capitulation that puts political retribution over hospitals' ethical and legal obligations to, and the well-being of, trans youth."

Myeshia Price, an Indiana University associate professor of human development, told CBS News that cutting off hormone treatment could carry physical and social consequences for patients already on the therapy. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani called the hospital's decision an "alarming example of a private institution caving to pressure from the federal government."

Those concerns deserve a direct counterpoint: no court has ruled the care itself was medically improper, and the DOJ's fraud allegations remain unproven allegations, not adjudicated findings. NYU Langone's own statement explicitly denies liability, and the settlement does not constitute a determination that the hospital broke the law.

Divergent Framing

The New York Post's account frames NYU Langone as caving "after a short fight." That undersells the record. The investigation ran more than a year, involved a subpoena the hospital fought in court, produced a federal injunction blocking the DOJ from getting records, and left a DOJ appeal still pending in the Second Circuit as of the settlement date. Calling that a short fight glosses over the litigation history other outlets, including Washington Square News and CBS News, documented in detail.

What's Next

NYU Langone will continue gender-affirming care for adults over 18 and its pediatric mental health programs, according to CBS News. The DOJ's press release did not specify how the $8.5 million will be spent, though The Advocate noted prior settlements earmarked funds for so-called detransition services. UPMC settled the same day for $950,000. Mount Sinai, Texas Children's Hospital, the Cleveland Clinic and Connecticut Children's Hospital have all reached similar deals, and Shumate said DOJ investigations into other providers remain ongoing. The pending Second Circuit appeal over the original subpoena has not been resolved, leaving open whether courts will ultimately back the DOJ's demand for identifying patient records in future cases.