A nearly 20-year Air Force veteran filed a class action lawsuit against the US Department of Veterans Affairs alleging that she was denied reproductive services because she is married to a woman.
The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in Massachusetts federal court, alleges that plaintiff Ashley Sheffield was denied a referral for in vitro fertilization, or IVF, treatment to which she was entitled, and that other people in same-sex marriages sex seeking IVF face similar discrimination.
“Like many LGBTQ service veterans, I served honorably in the Armed Forces and earned health benefits enjoyed by millions of veterans,” Sheffield said in a statement. The benefits of IVF because we are in same-sex marriages. We have the right to equal treatment and should no longer be treated as second class citizens.”
His attorneys say a law known as the Appropriations Act of 2021 gave the VA the ability to provide IVF services to qualified veterans with their legal spouses. However, it refers to the long-standing Defense of Marriage Act policy that does not recognize same-sex couples as legitimate spouses, according to the lawsuit.
“The government decided that Ms. Sheffield does not qualify for fertility services, including IVF, because she is a cisgender woman married to a cisgender woman,” the lawsuit says. “This decision and policy are inexplicable and inconceivable a decade after the Supreme Court ruled that the federal government cannot deny equal treatment to people in same-sex marriages.”
Covered veterans must have some form of “service-connected disability” that prevents them from procreating on their own in order to get benefits for procedures like IVF, according to the lawsuit, which says Sheffield had various physical and mental health conditions after his death. service, including ovarian adhesions, which may affect fertility.
Sheffield sought fertility services through the military, initially using another type of procedure eight times without success, before being referred for IVF, according to the lawsuit. At the time, Sheffield said he was denied IVF due to his marriage to another woman.
The lawsuit cites a letter sent to Sheffield in 2021 that said: “You are not qualified if you are (sic) in a same-sex marriage or if the sperm is donated by someone other than a male spouse. I’m sorry.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Veterans Affairs told NBC10 Boston that the agency cannot comment on pending litigation, but noted that providing reproductive health care to all its members is one of the VA’s top priorities.
“We at the VA have limited legal authority to provide assisted reproductive technology, including in vitro fertilization, to veterans,” VA Press Secretary Terrence Hayes said in a statement. “The president’s fiscal year 2024 budget presentation included a legislative proposal to amend the VA’s statutory authority and expand access to fertility treatment, including IVF and adoption reimbursement, to unmarried veterans, those in same-sex relationships sex and those who need donor gametes and/or embryos to build their families. VA strongly supports this proposal, which would ‘fill the gap created by legal requirements, exclusions and limitations in the current VA program.'”
Presidents submit budget proposals to Congress each year, but the House and Senate submit their own budget resolutions. Whether they will incorporate the amendment into VA’s authority to expand access to fertility treatment depends on those negotiations.
