LANSING, Mich. (WZMQ) – The Supreme Court of the United States has sent a high-profile challenge to a state conversion therapy ban back to a lower court, emphasizing that judges must take a closer look at how the First Amendment applies to talk therapy.
In its March 31 decision, the court ruled that the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit did not apply a strong enough constitutional standard when it upheld Colorado’s ban on conversion therapy for minors. Rather than strike down the law, the justices directed the lower court to reconsider the case under more rigorous First Amendment scrutiny.
The case centers on a licensed counselor who uses only talk therapy and argues that the law restricts what she can say to clients about sexual orientation and gender identity.
Michigan State University law professor Heather Johnson said the ruling is intentionally limited in both scope and legal posture.
“This is a very narrow case,” Johnson said. “It’s only talk therapy, and it’s only as applied to this one counselor.”
They explained that the distinction matters because the challenge is not to the law as a whole, but only to how it applies in one specific context.
“The alternative is a facial challenge, saying the whole law is unconstitutional,” Johnson said. “That’s not what’s happening here. This is designed to be narrow from the outset.”
The court also confined its analysis to speech-based therapy, not the broader range of practices often associated with conversion therapy.
“Conversion therapy is a huge gamut of things,” she said. “What’s in question is none of the physical or aversion-based practices. What we’re talking about only is talk therapy, a very narrow slice.”
That framing raises a more complex constitutional question: whether conversations between a licensed therapist and a client should be treated as protected speech or as part of regulated medical care.
“There’s a conflict here between a therapist’s opinion or religious beliefs and what it means to medically advise a patient,” Johnson said. “And that’s why you see such a sharp divide in how courts analyze this.”
The Supreme Court did not resolve that question. Instead, it sent the case back for further review under a higher legal standard, leaving open the possibility that the law could still be upheld.
“Courts can still find that even under strict scrutiny, the law passes,” they said, pointing to decades of research cited by major medical organizations that have deemed conversion therapy harmful and ineffective.
The ruling does not immediately affect Michigan’s law banning conversion therapy for minors, which remains in place.
However, a similar case is already moving through the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. In that case, a Catholic charity argues Michigan’s law violates both free speech and religious freedom protections, a broader set of claims than those raised in Colorado.
Johnson said the legal paths in the two cases could diverge.
“The Sixth Circuit may make a different decision,” she said. “And if different courts rule differently, that’s when you start to see a circuit split.”
Such a split could eventually send the issue back to the Supreme Court for a more definitive ruling.
For now, any resolution remains distant.
“Nothing is going to be immediate,” Johnson said. “The law moves very slowly, and this is just one step in a much longer process.”
They added that even beyond the courts, lawmakers could step in to revise how these laws are written and enforced, potentially shaping how future challenges are decided.
“There’s so much nuance and so much wiggle room. It’s really hard to say how this is going to turn out because there are so many moving pieces.” Johnson said, “This is the beginning. It is one step in a much longer process, so people might be tired, they may want to give up, and yet, I think it really is important to pay attention. You know, votes matter, legislation matters, speaking up and making sure that we want to have a regulated Professional Standards matter, and I think those all come into play in this case,”
