The federal government’s foremost consumer protection agency has an “unequivocal basis” to start investigating the transgender medicine industry after a workshop highlighting stakeholders’ horror stories, Mark Meador of the Federal Trade Commission told The Daily Signal.
The FTC hosted a daylong workshop on Wednesday called “The Dangers of Gender-Affirming Care for Minors” to hear from parents and patients and determine whether the transgender industry has deceived families.
“I think they gave a lot of extremely alarming and concerning information that absolutely gives us the basis to investigate, to fill out the entire legal framework that we would need to pursue a case,” Meador said in an exclusive interview with The Daily Signal after the workshop.
“There’s a lot of things that need to be verified—dot the I’s, cross the T’s, that sort of thing,” he explained. “But I think what we saw today gave us an unequivocal basis to start investigating and determining how and where there have been violations.”
The statute that created the Federal Trade Commission authorizes it to investigate and prevent “unfair or deceptive” practices affecting consumers.
To conduct the investigation, the FTC can use compulsory process, which entails sending subpoenas or something akin to subpoenas requiring individuals, companies, and medical practices to provide documents, testimony, and written answers to questions. The FTC also uses documents and testimony from third parties to determine whether the law has been violated.