Notice of Vacatur Regarding Certain Provisions of the 2024 Nondiscrimination in Health Programs and Activities Final Rule

What it does

This is to inform the public that, on October 22, 2025, the United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi issued an order in Tennessee v. Kennedy, No. 1:24-cv-161-LG-BWR (S.D. Miss. Oct. 22, 2025), vacating portions of the final rule titled "Nondiscrimination in Health Programs and Activities," published May 6, 2024 (89 FR 37522). Specifically, the court vacated certain provisions of the regulation to the extent they expand Title IX's definition of sex discrimination to include gender-identity discrimination. Pursuant to the court's order, the vacated provisions are legally void. The other provisions of the Section 1557 Rule remain in force.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services's summary, as published in the Federal Register.

What changed in the regulation

10 parts of Title 42, 45 of the Code of Federal Regulations:

42 CFR 438, 42 CFR 440, 42 CFR 457, 42 CFR 460, 45 CFR 80, 45 CFR 84, 45 CFR 92, 45 CFR 147, 45 CFR 155, 45 CFR 156

Compared with

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has published 24 final rules in 2026 so far, compared with 12 in all of 2025.

Counted by the Tribune from Federal Register records since Jan. 1, 2025.

What happens next and when

The Tennessee court issued its vacatur order on October 22, 2025. As long as the specified provisions of the 2024 Section 1557 Rule remain vacated, OCR and CMS cannot and will not enforce the vacated provisions.

The agency's dates, word for word.

Check it yourself

• The document in the Federal Register
• Title 42 on eCFR

The record as published

Source: the Federal Register (public domain). The document in the Federal Register