The U.S. Supreme Court has cleared the way for the Trump administration to implement a policy requiring U.S. passports to list a traveler’s sex assigned at birth based on biological characteristics.
On his first day in office, President Donald Trump signed an executive order declaring that the U.S. government recognizes only two genders, effectively erasing transgender identity. The order promised to uphold the “biological reality of sex” and directed the State Department to revise passport policy to “accurately reflect the gender of the holder.”
In response, Secretary of State Marco Rubio ordered State Department officials to freeze all passport applications with the “X” gender marker and requests to change the gender marker on existing passports.
American Civil Liberties Union sued It challenged the policy in February, arguing that it violates transgender Americans’ right to equal protection and the Administrative Procedure Act, which governs how federal agencies create or change regulations.
Plaintiffs also argued that the policy effectively makes transgender people “out” and exposes them to harassment, violence, and even incarceration if their gender identity or expression does not match their assigned sex at birth.
In April, U.S. District Judge Julia Kovic of Massachusetts issued the following ruling: preliminary injunction The move prevents the State Department from denying applications by six transgender and non-binary Americans who sued the Trump administration to change their passport gender markings.
In June, Mr. Kovic expanded on the order, issuing a broad injunction prohibiting the State Department from denying applications seeking a change in gender marker or a gender-neutral “X” designation.
The Trump administration appealed, but the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals refused to block Kovic’s order. The administration then filed an emergency appeal to the Supreme Court, citing an earlier high court ruling on the state’s ban on gender-affirming care. Government lawyers argued that the passport provision does not constitute sex discrimination if it applies equally to everyone, and that courts do not have the authority to review presidential actions that may violate the Administrative Procedure Act.
On November 6, the Supreme Court’s conservative majority sided with the Trump administration and allowed it to begin enforcing passport restrictions on transgender people, in a ruling from a shadow docket that deals with urgent matters outside the normal vetting process.
“Indicating a passport holder’s gender at birth does not violate the equal protection principle any more than indicating the country of birth. In both cases, the government is merely establishing a historical fact that no one is subject to discriminatory treatment,” the court said in an unsigned order. “And on this record, defendants have failed to demonstrate that the government’s choice to label biological sex “lacks any purpose other than a naked desire to harm politically unpopular groups.”
In a blistering dissent, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor, condemned the majority’s decision, noting that the Trump administration had not presented any evidence that it would be harmed if it were barred from enforcing gender restrictions on passports.
“The court … gave no consideration to the plaintiffs, choosing instead to intervene in favor of the government in a way that allows the most vulnerable parties to be harmed without fair justification,” Jackson wrote. “Such senseless avoidance of clearly just outcomes has become an unfortunate pattern. Similarly, I myself refuse to turn a blind eye when basic principles are selectively discarded. Any) Justification. ”
The underlying case has not yet been decided on its merits and will still have to go through normal court proceedings. Meanwhile, the ruling leaves transgender Americans who have already renewed their passports unsure whether they will be forced back to their assigned gender. The administration had previously indicated that these passports would remain valid.
Individuals who filed gender change applications after the injunction were required to sign a certification. As Erin Reid reported in her Erin in the morning Substack said in court filings that if the government regains authority to enforce the restrictions, it plans to revoke passports issued to those who signed the application.
The American Civil Liberties Union, which represents transgender plaintiffs, called the decision “a heartbreaking setback for everyone’s freedom to be themselves.”
Source: Metro Weekly – www.metroweekly.com
