Oregon to let woman adopt amid battle over gender ideology

Oregon officials agreed to a court order directing them to pay costs and attorney’s fees for Jessica Bates, who sued the state in 2023 over a rule that required her to conform to gender ideology stipulations before she could successfully apply for an adoption license, Alliance Defending Freedom said Monday. Officials also agreed to make a previous temporary injunction permanent. The injunction allowed Bates to apply for a license to adopt children from foster care while the court case continued. The final agreement ended Bates’ three-year legal battle, according to ADF.

Bates, a widowed mother of five, said she believed God wanted her to adopt. She was grateful for the outcome of the lawsuit, according to ADF. The new court order doesn’t guarantee that Bates will receive a license to adopt, but it states that she can’t be excluded from consideration for a placement solely due to her Christian beliefs and actions.

Bates originally filed her lawsuit to challenge an Oregon Department of Human Services rule which blocked her from adopting any child due to her Christian beliefs on sex and gender. The department denied Bates’ first application for a license because she said she would not use inaccurate pronouns for a child or allow a child to receive cross-sex hormones for a gender transition, according to ADF.

How has the Oregon Department of Human Services responded? WORLD reached out to the department on Monday. This story will be updated with any response received. In court documents, Oregon Department of Human Services officials denied various claims made by Bates, including the claim that administering hormone shots to children amounted to abuse, and that the chances of a child experiencing gender dysphoria were extremely remote. They admitted however, that Bates was told that failure to support a child’s sexual orientation, so-called gender identity, or gender expression could be grounds to deny her application for an adoption license.

Dig deeper: Read Liz Lykins’ report on the previous court injunction allowing Bates to reapply for her license.