A major New York City hospital system said it has received a grand jury subpoena from a federal prosecutor in Texas demanding information about adolescents who received gender-related medical care during the past six years.
NYU Langone disclosed that it received the subpoena last week and was asked “to provide information pertaining to patients under the age of 18 who received gender-affirming care” between 2020 and 2026. The subpoena also requested the names of NYU Langone medical staff members who provided the treatment between 2020 and 2026.
The subpoena sets up a potential showdown between the Justice Department and one of Manhattan’s leading medical institutions. The hospital said that it was weighing what to do next.
“We understand that these developments may be concerning to our patients, providers and others,” the health system said in a statement. “Please know that NYU Langone takes the privacy of your protected health information very seriously, and we are evaluating our response to the subpoena.”
The U.S. attorney’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday. U.S. attorneys can issue subpoenas anywhere in the country for federal investigations.
Several New York hospitals had built robust transgender health practices during the last decade, treating not only adults but adolescents. NYU Langone had one of the most prominent. It once advertised on its website a Transgender Youth Health Program, with treatments including “puberty suppression, hormone therapy and social and emotional support.” The hospital announced in February that it was ending that program amid threats from the federal government to withhold all federal funding to the hospital.
The Trump administration has sought to put an end to gender-related treatments for adolescents who say they feel a mismatch between their gender identity and the sex they were assigned at birth, known as gender dysphoria. An executive order from President Trump in January 2025 described transgender children as impressionable and called for hospitals to stop providing puberty blocker medication to these patients as well as hormone therapy, such as testosterone, for trans boys. The order states that providing transition care amounted to “maiming and sterilizing” them.
Some medical experts have concerns about the long-term side effects of puberty blockers and hormones on brain development, bone density and fertility. Puberty blockers can help some children with gender dysphoria navigate their feelings and identity, reducing depression and distress, experts and parents say.
The Trump administration had instructed the Justice Department and other agencies to examine whether some transgender medical procedures violate federal laws.
Last year, the F.B.I. asked the public to call its tip line with information about doctors “who mutilate” children “under the guise of gender-affirming care.” The Federal Trade Commission has been examining whether medical providers may have deceived patients by making unsubstantiated claims about the effectiveness of puberty blockers and hormone treatments, or by omitting warnings about risks to adolescent patients. The Justice Department has said that it is investigating whether providers had committed fraud.
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In a notice on its website, NYU Langone says that it was one of several institutions to receive grand jury subpoenas on May 7 from the U.S. attorney’s office in the Northern District of Texas.
The location may prove significant. A federal judge in that district moved quickly to enforce an administrative subpoena that the Justice Department had issued in recent weeks to Rhode Island Hospital about an investigation into the use of puberty blockers and hormone therapy.
A New York law requires NYU Langone to first notify the state attorney general before complying with the subpoena. The law also requires NYU Langone to try to notify affected patients.
The executive director of the Christopher Street Project, a political action committee and nonprofit that was started in response to Mr. Trump’s transgender policies, expressed hope that the hospital and attorney general’s office would fight the subpoena. In the past, the office of New York’s attorney general has encouraged NYU Langone to continue providing transition treatments to adolescents, even in the face of threats from the federal government. The attorney general’s office has said that denying such treatment to trans youth could violate anti-discrimination laws.
Broader questions about transition care for young people have been the subject of intense debate in the United States and Europe.
In Europe, there has been a pronounced shift in medical practice that has made some transition care less available to children. Across the United States, more than two dozen states have put restrictions or bans on certain medical interventions for transgender children.
“We won’t allow anti-trans extremists to come into New York and steal our patient data and use it to investigate and criminalize trans kids and providers and their parents,” said Tyler Hack, the executive director of the Christopher Street Project.
A spokesman for NYU Langone declined to comment.
Joseph Goldstein covers health care in New York for The Times, following years of criminal justice and police reporting.
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