The Supreme Court declined to take up a case seeking to overturn Washington state's ban on the practice of conversion therapy for minors who say they are gay or lesbian, prompting the court's most conservative members to say they would have granted it.

Despite three dissents from Republican-appointed Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, and Brett Kavanaugh, the majority on the bench decided to leave intact Washington state's ban on engaging LGBT minors in conversion therapy, which mirrors similar restrictions in 20 other states.

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The case involved Christian licensed marriage and family therapist Brian Tingley, who sued the Evergreen State in 2021, claiming the law barred licensed mental health professionals from treating minors with gender dysphoria or same-sex impulses by recommending against gender transitions. Tingley said the law violated his First Amendment rights and infringed on his religious faith.

Thomas was sympathetic to Tingley's argument, saying that under the law, “licensed counselors cannot voice anything other than the state-approved opinion on minors with gender dysphoria without facing punishment.”

The justice added that while the majority declined to consider the case, he has "no doubt that the issue it presents will come before the Court again."

"When it does, the Court should do what it should have done here: grant certiorari to consider what the First Amendment requires," Thomas added.

Tingley is represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative Christian legal group that has seen a string of success arguing religious rights and related cases at the high court, including the case that saw the overturning of Roe v. Wade that gave states the right to restrict abortions in 2022.

Attorneys for Washington state argued the lawsuit shouldn't be pertinent for high court review considering that Tingley was one of several licensed therapists who had objected to the law. They also argued that the law only prevents conversion therapy in a professional setting, arguing it does not block similar counseling from happening in other settings, like churches.

The Supreme Court has in the past rejected challenges to similar state laws but has only had its 6-3 Republican-appointed majority since 2020, and it has used that to an advantage that has reworked previous long-standing precedent on other controversial social issues.

Washington state defines "conversion therapy" as "a regime that seeks to change an individual's sexual orientation or gender identity."

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The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in January rejected Tingley's attempt to overturn Washington's ban on conversion therapy for children, disagreeing with his argument that the law was "unconstitutionally vague."

The 2018 law was signed by Gov. Jay Inslee (D-WA) as a measure to shield LGBT youth from what proponents claimed were unproven and damaging efforts to convert sexual orientation.