Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has filed unprecedented fraud lawsuits against two North Texas doctors, accusing them of illegally providing gender transition treatments to minors and fraudulently billing Medicaid to cover up their actions.
Dr. May Lau, an adolescent medicine specialist at Children’s Medical Center Dallas, has already surrendered her Texas medical license in response to the legal action. The lawsuit, filed in October 2024, claims she violated Senate Bill 14 by prescribing testosterone to 21 minor patients after the law took effect in 2023, according to documents reviewed by KERA News.
First-of-its-kind legal action
The lawsuits mark the first statewide healthcare fraud claims related to gender transition care for children in Texas. Paxton’s office announced the legal actions through its Healthcare Program Enforcement Division, targeting both Lau and Dr. M. Brett Cooper for allegedly administering gender transition drugs to minors and then fraudulently billing Texas Medicaid.
“What these radicals were doing was evil, and I will pursue every available legal tool to stop and punish this cruel child abuse,” Paxton stated in a press release. “Any fraudulent scheme to steal hardworking Texans’ taxpayer dollars will be stopped and repaid in full.”
At the heart of the lawsuits are accusations of deliberate deception. The Attorney General’s office claims both doctors engaged in “falsifying records, altering diagnosis codes, and submitting deceptive billing information” to conceal gender transition interventions and obtain Medicaid funds that Texas law explicitly prohibits.
In one specific instance, Paxton accused Lau of inserting a puberty blocker device into a 15-year-old patient and then billing the patient’s insurance for an endocrine disorder instead of gender dysphoria to secure Medicaid reimbursement. He labeled her a “scofflaw” and a “radical gender activist” in official communications.
Legal foundation and financial penalties
The legal basis for these lawsuits stems from Senate Bill 14, which bans gender-affirming care for minors in Texas. The Texas Supreme Court upheld the law in June 2024, reversing a lower court ruling that had sided with families of transgender Texans who sought to block its implementation.
What’s at stake financially? Paxton is seeking triple the amount of improperly paid Medicaid funds plus substantial civil penalties under the Texas Health Care Program Fraud Prevention Act. The Attorney General vowed to ensure “Texas is repaid for the evil performed by the doctors.”
This isn’t Paxton’s first attempt to use SB 14 against medical providers. Shortly after filing against Lau, he brought similar claims against El Paso endocrinologist Hector Granados, though that case was eventually dropped after a review found no violations.
Defense pushes back
But are these accusations being made fairly? Dr. Brett Cooper’s legal team doesn’t think so. In court filings, they’ve accused Paxton’s office of issuing misleading press releases that alleged Cooper had knowingly and illegally prescribed hormones for gender transition before any evidence was even produced.
“If the State continues to make unrestrained, misleading, and defamatory statements to the public, it will prevent Dr. Cooper from obtaining a fair and impartial jury,” Cooper’s attorneys argued in the filing.
The surrendering of Lau’s medical license represents a significant victory for Paxton, who has made opposition to gender-affirming care for minors a cornerstone of his agenda. Meanwhile, the medical community remains divided on these treatments, with major medical associations supporting gender-affirming care while conservative lawmakers across multiple states have moved to restrict it.
As these cases proceed through the courts, they’ll likely set important precedents for how healthcare fraud statutes can be applied to controversial medical treatments—and whether doctors who provided care they believed appropriate will face not just professional consequences, but potentially ruinous financial penalties as well.
