Exclusive: Experts say Alliance Defending Freedom, arguing to revive conversion therapy, ‘profoundly misrepresented’ their work in case threatening trans and queer youth

On Tuesday, a Christian legal group will urge the US supreme court to overturn a ban on anti-LGBTQ+ “conversion therapy” in a case that could erode protections for transgender and queer youth across the country.

Lawyers from Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), which has opposed abortion and LGBTQ+ rights in high-profile litigation, are representing a woman challenging a 2019 Colorado law that prohibited conversion practices for youth under age 18. The ban applies to licensed clinicians who seek to change a patient’s sexual orientation or gender identity, tactics medical groups have discredited as harmful and ineffective.

ADF’s petition in the case, Chiles v Salazar, cited several scholars to support its argument that conversion practices should once again be permitted. Two of those experts, however, told the Guardian that ADF had “profoundly” misrepresented their research, which discussed the “psychological damage” of conversion therapy.