Late Monday witnessed President Donald Trump making a sweeping move to ceases federal recognition of transgender individuals in an executive order. This move forms part of a broader spectrum of executive actions taken to roll back Joe Biden’s endeavors to endorse diversity and curb discrimination. The order came with a specification that the federal government will from now on only acknowledge two, fixed genders.
In addition to this, Trump issued a series of other orders that were designed to counteract allowances made during the Biden-era for transgender military personnel and the modification of gender data on passports, among other provisions. The insistence in Trump’s order for a bill that federally approves only two genders is expected to heavily amplify congressional battles concerning gender-affirming healthcare and safeguards against discrimination.
In the previous year, a law restricting Tricare from covering gender-affirming treatments for minors was passed in Congress. Additionally, the House has frequently deliberated amendments to spending bills which would impact the accessibility of transgender healthcare. Monday’s actions taken by Trump carry possible implications for judicial proceedings relating to the rights of LGBTQ individuals.
There are ongoing legal disputes inherited by the Trump administration surrounding state laws that pose restrictions or outright bans on gender-affirming care for underaged persons. One such case that is currently under review by the Supreme Court could be affected by Monday’s executive order.
Trump’s executive order on Monday postulated that attempts to discredit the biological fact of sex is in essence an assault on women, as it deprives them of their dignity, security, and well-being. The order mandates that the federal government cease to support gender identity, favoring references to biological sex over gender, and ceasing to issue new passports or other government documents that facilitate sex changes.
Moreover, the order calls for an end to the incorrect application of a 2020 Supreme Court ruling that stated the Civil Rights Act made workplace discrimination against LGBTQ individuals unlawful. The Department of Justice was directed to dispense guidance to assert the freedom to express the binary nature of sex, and to defend this freedom through litigation in workplaces and entities receiving federal aid.
Notable in its absence from Monday’s order was any mention or consideration for intersex individuals or others who may not fit within the newly defined federal parameters. Transgender individuals represent approximately 1 percent of the American population, as stated by the Census Bureau.
Further inclusive of the order were provisions seeking to convert it into legislation. The President of the advocacy group, the Human Rights Campaign, Kelley Robinson, flippantly asserted Trump was ‘taking aim at the LGBTQ+ community instead of uniting our country and focusing on the important problems Americans are contending with.’
Robinson’s comments continued with a grandstanding promise to the LGBTQ+ community that they ‘are not going anywhere. and we will fight back against these damaging assertions with everything we’ve got.’, a sentiment that seems rather misplaced amid the more pressing issues at hand.
Support for the move was widespread among Trump’s Republican colleagues in Congress, with individuals like Georgia’s Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene lauding the fulfillment of Trump’s campaign promises. ‘No biological man should ever occupy our spaces or try to usurp our role. It was incredibly important. That was one of his campaign promises, a topic I’ve talked to him about repeatedly, and I was delighted to hear him articulate it.’ was Greene’s reaction following Trump’s inaugural address.
Representative Mark Takano, Democratic member for California and the chair of the Equality Caucus, hastily claimed that Trump was attempting to ‘erase the existence’ of transgender people with the order, bringing little substance to his statement.
Takano went on to accuse the Republicans of attempted distraction from the planned tax cuts for billionaires through the widespread anti-LGBTQI+ sentiment, a claim which seems to lack legitimate roots, ‘Make no mistake: these attacks on our community are part of a larger strategy by Republicans to distract the American people with the enormous tax cuts they intend to award their over-privileged friends. These are cuts that they intend to finance through the slashing of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid’, declaimed Takano.