Trans Activists March in Downtown Boston, Bringing Trans Healthcare Fight To The State Legislature
Following Fenway Health’s decision to discontinue gender affirming care for trans people under the age of 19, activists took to the streets to march in protest.
Protestors hold a banner and signs calling for a trans healthcare shield law at the front of the march, heading towards the Statehouse
By Joanna McCoy
by Joanna Mccoy
Last Sunday, February 8, over 100 protestors braved the sub-freezing temperatures and flurries of snow to march against Fenway Health’s decision to deny care to all patients under 19, and to raise awareness of a new legislative package that would defend trans rights at the state level. The crowd assembled in the Boston Common at 1 p.m., and listened to speeches from six trans activists and speakers before taking a circuitous route through Boston’s downtown area to the Statehouse. The protest was organized primarily by Protect Trans Futures in collaboration with several other activist organizations, including HELP By AMG, and Boston Dyke March.
When Fenway Health announced they would no longer provide gender-affirming care to patients under 19 in October of 2025, Protect Trans Futures was one of the first organizations on the scene to picket, protest and pressure the healthcare nonprofit back into alignment with its stated values on trans and LGBTQ+ healthcare.
Teddy Walker, founder of Protect Trans Futures and a consistent critic of Fenway Health’s withdrawal of care, explained Fenway Health was not the true enemy in the fight to preserve gender-affirming care in Massachusetts. “I think there’s a misconception that Protect Trans Futures is calling for Fenway Health to lose all their funding…What we’re asking is for Fenway Health to fight the Trump administration.”
In an interview with Assigned Media, Walker went on to outline the Trans Healthcare Shield, a proposed legislative package with “three policies and one demand for the attorney general,” which would update the state’s current Shield 2.0 Law and create a network of public clinics immune to federal meddling, fund providers who lose funds for treating trans patients, protect healthcare data from being bought by anti-trans or anti-abortion groups, and urge Attorney General Andrea Campbell to investigate hospitals that refuse to offer gender-affirming care in Massachusetts.
“We need acts of courage during this time,” Walker continued, “Allyship is not what institutions do when they get millions in federal funding for our care. It’s what they do when the federal government is attacking us and incentivizing an institution to turn their backs on us.”
A protestor holds up a handmade sign at the Brewer Fountain in the Boston Common
By Joanna McCoy
Speakers at Sunday’s protest included leaders of influential nonprofits and longtime activists in the trans community such as Alejandra Caraballo, an instructor at Harvard, legal attorney and former board member of Fenway Health. Caraballo wasn’t the only speaker at the protest with a past connection to Fenway Health. Ephraim Akiva, Co-Founder and Senior Director of Anemoni Peer Respite, was a former patient at the healthcare nonprofit for almost two decades. “It is devastating to me to see them back down in the face of fascism,” Akiva said during his speech, “I feel so upset for all the trans children because this is our future, and they’re destroying our future. We’re not going to let them!”
Likewise, Elijah Oyenuga, an independent consultant for LGBTQ advocacy groups, reflected on his time working with Fenway Health in an interview: “I don’t like Fenway Health, just as a person who worked for them…but we need to stand in solidarity, because it’s only through solidarity that we can plan our next steps. We can’t be permanently angry because you’ve done something out of concern for the patients you have to treat.”
The march route wound through downtown Boston, where a handful of passersby cheered and honked their horns in support, and came to a halt in front of the Massachusetts statehouse by 3 p.m., trailed by two police cruisers with lights flashing. Protestors ranging from young children to white-haired retirees held up hand-painted signs and brushed snow off their shoulders on the stone steps of the statehouse’s main entrance. College students from schools across Boston were represented at the protest, including Lokesh, the chair of Northeastern’s Young Democratic Socialists Of America chapter.
“Trans rights have always been in a strange, precarious place,” they said in an interview, “Trans people demonstrate that the existing gender conventions do not need to exist in any capacity…the work of anti-capitalism and anti-fascism is completely necessary to the liberation of trans and queer people.”
Fenway Health’s board of directors may have little stomach for a fight with the Trump administration, but activists in Boston remain steadfast in their efforts to hold the nonprofit accountable to its patients, making it clear that as the queer community resists Trump’s depredations, they expect their institutions to stand alongside them. Protect Trans Futures’ new focus on a legislative package and promises of more state funding for trans healthcare initiatives demonstrates the power of a dual focus for trans activists, by leveraging both the power of votes in the statehouse and voices in the streets.
Joanna Mccoy is a Northeastern student and freelance photojournalist specializing in political coverage and local news. Her work has previously appeared in the Huntington News, the Cambridge Day, and other Boston-based publications. In her spare time, she dumpster dives, plays guitar, and stands in the corner at local raves. More of her photography can be found at @jfrombostonphotography