In an 8-1 decision, the Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled against Colorado’s ban on so-called “conversion therapy” for minors as a likely violation of counselors’ free speech rights under the First Amendment.

LGBTQ groups, who have hailed conversion therapy bans as critical to the mental health of minors figuring out their identities during adolescence, say the decision will mean more kids are “traumatized” going forward. 

Justice Neil Gorsuch, in the court’s opinion, said the law — enacted in 2019 to protect minors from efforts by mental health providers to change their sexual orientation or gender identity — “censors speech based on viewpoint” and must be subjected to the highest form of legal scrutiny, which a lower court had not applied.    

“Colorado may regard its policy as essential to public health and safety. Certainly, censorious governments throughout history have believed the same,” Gorsuch wrote.

“But the First Amendment stands as a shield against any effort to enforce orthodoxy in thought or speech in this country,” he continued. “It reflects instead a judgment that every American possesses an inalienable right to think and speak freely, and a faith in the free marketplace of ideas as the best means for discovering truth. However well-intentioned, any law that suppresses speech based on viewpoint represents an ‘egregious’ assault on both of those commitments.” 

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was the lone dissenter. 

“Our precedents do not compel this conclusion,” Jackson wrote. “Speech uttered for purposes of providing medical treatment may be restricted incidentally when the state reasonably regulates the speaker’s provision of medical treatments to patients.” 

A Christian licensed therapist from Colorado Springs, Kaley Chiles, brought the legal challenge, alleging the law violates her free speech rights and prevents her from openly talking with clients about their desire to rid themselves of same-sex attractions or better align with their biological sex.

“Colorado law does not just regulate the content of Ms. Chiles’ speech. It goes a step further,” Gorsuch wrote, “prescribing what views she may and may not express.” 

The decision sends the case back to a lower court for further review of the law.

Colorado will likely no longer be able to forbid state licensed providers from attempting to change a patient’s orientation through talk therapy.

“States cannot silence voluntary conversations that help young people seeking to grow comfortable with their bodies,” said Jim Campell, the attorney for Chiles who argued the case before the court. “The decision today is a significant win for free speech, common sense, and families desperate to help their children.”

Conversion therapy has been widely discredited by major American mental health and medical organizations for decades. Half the states in the U.S. have outlawed the practice as ineffective and harmful to minors, often on a bipartisan basis. Those laws are now in question. 

Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson said that more kids will “suffer” as a result of this decision.

“Today’s reckless decision means more American kids will suffer. The Court has weaponized free-speech in order to prioritize anti-LGBTQ+ bias over the safety, health and wellbeing of children,” Robinson said in a statement.