Groups suing the state over restrictions barring birth certificate amendments are asking a district court to hold the state health department in civil contempt.
The state health department announced earlier this month the reinstatement of a rule effectively banning transgender Montanans from updating the gender marker on their birth certificates after the state Supreme Court found issues with a block on it.
Montana’s high court affirmed Yellowstone County District Court Judge Michael Moses’s block on a law regulating birth certificate amendments. That ruling said that the department should have returned to a 2017 rule that allowed for updates.
Instead, the department created the new ban on amendments, but the high court found Moses could not block that ban unless there was a direct complaint against it. A direct complaint is now pending in court.
ACLU of Montana is asking a court to hold the health department in civil contempt, aiming to force officials to rescind the rule.
The state health department declined to comment.