Free Speech and Professional Regulation

In an 8–1 decision, the Supreme Court sided with Christian counselor Kaley Chiles (represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom), finding that Colorado’s ban on so‑called “conversion therapy” for minors—at least as applied to licensed counselors’ talk therapy—impermissibly targets speech based on viewpoint and must be reviewed under more exacting First Amendment scrutiny. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented from the bench, warning that equating professional medical regulation with ordinary speech risks undermining states’ ability to protect patients and highlighting the documented harms of conversion therapy, while Justice Elena Kagan (joined by Sonia Sotomayor) used a concurrence footnote to sharply rebuke Jackson’s expansive framing of regulable professional conduct.