Same-sex adoption in the United States

Until 2017, laws related to LGBTQ+ couples adopting children varied by state. Some states granted full adoption rights to same-sex couples, while others banned same-sex adoption or only allowed one partner in a same-sex relationship to adopt the biological child of the other.

On 31 March 2016, Federal District Court struck down Mississippi's ban on same-sex couple adoptions.^[1] On June 26, 2017, the United States Supreme Court reversed an Arkansas Supreme Court ruling that allowed a law listing parents by gender on birth certificates to stand. The new SCOTUS ruling allowed both same-sex spouses to be listed on birth certificates.^[2] These court rulings made adoption by same-sex couples legal in all 50 states.

In 2022, Congress passed the Respect for Marriage Act which requires that states respect marriage licenses of same-sex couples as long as the marriage was valid in the state in which it was performed. This act repeals the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act which defined marriage as the union of one man and one woman and allowed states to decline to recognize same-sex marriages that were performed in other states. The Respect for Marriage Act will legally defend the rights and protections to which LGBTQ+ and interracial couples and their children are entitled.^[3]

Attitudes toward same-sex parenting have improved as the number of same-sex couples and same-sex parenting overall has increased in the United States. From 2007 to 2011, public condemnation of same-sex parenting in the U.S. dropped from 50% to 35%, while acceptance has remained relatively stable.^[4]

In 2023, same-sex couples were more likely to raise an adopted child. 4% of adopted children and 3% of foster children were being raised by LGBTQ+ couples. After Mississippi was the last state to overturn laws banning LGBTQ+ adoption and the federal marriage equality ruling in 2015, there are now protection rights for same-sex couples to adopt throughout the United States which has brought more acceptance and support for same-sex couples when adopting children.^[5]

Studies have found that same-sex couples often favor adoption as the method for starting a family. They tend to place significantly less emphasis on the biological methods of conceiving a child than heterosexual families do. LGBTQ families are up to 10 times more likely to adopt than heterosexual couples. Additionally, an organization called Creating A Family reported that 60% of adoptions by LGBTQ families are transracial. One study even found that "gay and lesbian parents were more likely than heterosexual parents to be matched with hard-to-place children, partially because they were more open to being matched with children with hard-to-place profiles."^[6] Some argue that these statistics are due, in some part, to discriminatory practices that make it more difficult to adopt for LGBTQ families and deem minority children less “ideal” adoptees.