President Trump’s Executive Orders Targeting the Transgender Community: What We Know, and What Can We Do?

LID stands in solidarity with transgender, gender-nonconforming, and non-binary (TGNCNB) people across the country and condemns the cruel and transphobic executive orders that President Trump signed on his first day in office. These orders aim to erase the TGNCNB community and deny them full equality under the law. 

In a particularly cruel twist, transgender people in prisons and homeless shelters, already in deeply vulnerable and unsafe situations, would be forcibly detransitioned, placed in more harmful environments, and denied access to lifesaving medication under these deeply harmful executive orders. 

The order accomplishes its Orwellian objectives by defining terms such as women, men, female, male along purely biological means.  For example, “female” is defined as “a person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the large reproductive cell.”  

It is difficult to predict the full scope of the harms this order will cause.  Thanks to journalists and legal experts, we understand that the following programs and protections face the most immediate impact:

TGNCNB People in Federal Facilities

According to the ACLU, “the most immediate impacts will likely be felt by the more than 2000 transgender people currently held in federal custody.”  Specifically, the order redefines “males” to include transgender women, and bars them from admission into women’s facilities.  The order also cuts the use of federal funds for trans-affirming care in these facilities, the result being the forced detransitioning of these individuals.  

Those transgender women in federal prisons, homeless shelters and other facilities will be harmed the most.  States such as Florida have already enacted this type of policy, with gruesome results:

“They have had their heads forcibly shorn, feminine items confiscated, and been subjected to government-mandated conversion therapy.  In one Florida case, a judge went so far as to describe transgender inmates as individuals experiencing “short-term delusions.”  

Notably unclear is what impact this portion of the order has on transgender men incarcerated in federal facilities.  

Federal Identification

The EO next orders that all federal documents (passports, visas, global entry cards, etc) reflect its draconian definition of sex.  Given that an untold number of people already have federal identification that accurately matches their gender, we are not sure how implementation will work.  We can expect that this will apply to all newly issued documents, and some experts have expressed concern that documents containing nonbinary gender markers will be confiscated.

Bathrooms

Conservatives are obsessed with what queer people do in the bathroom, and this order is no different.  While it stops short of an outright bathroom ban in federal spaces, it lays the framework for agency executives to issue such orders by requiring the creation of “intimate spaces designed for women, girls, or females (or for men, boys or males)” that are “designated by sex and not identity.”  

This opens the doors to creating unsafe restroom conditions on federal parkland (such as Jacob Riis beach, a queer retreat for over 40 years), federally-run museums, hospitals and airports such as Dulles and Reagan in the D.C. area.  

Programs and Services

Under the Biden administration, trans-affirmative programming and policies began to flourish across many federal departments and in many areas of their work.  This includes the Departments of Defense Education, Housing, Health, Labor and more.  

The order callously rescinds Department of Education Title IX guidance protecting transgender individuals, policies that address anti-LGBTQ bullying, protections for intersex youth and more.  In this particular area, the order appears to go beyond transgender individuals and targets the entire LGBTQ community.  

Moreover, we know that Trump has furloughed thousands of federal employees implementing these and other DEI policies.  

IMPORTANT: These policies implement the federal government, federal agencies, and federally funded programs.  LID is grateful that our local state and city officials have been aware that New York needs to step in and do more.  

We fully expect many of these orders to be challenged in court, and we stand shoulder to shoulder with all those seeking to overturn these harmful policies. At the same time, the breadth and level of harm caused by these orders will be determined in many cases by the level of compliance and support they receive from state and local governments and employers. LID calls on all our elected officials in Brooklyn, NYC, and New York State to live up to the values of inclusiveness and equality that are core to our state, and resist these orders with lawsuits, noncompliance, organizing, public mobilization, and all the tools available to prioritize safety, respect, and inclusion for our TGNCNB community. This includes reinforcing existing policies, and passing new ones, such as the GIRDS Act, which would uphold the dignity of incarcerated TGNCNB people in New York State prisons. It also includes making it as easy, safe, and affordable as possible for TGNCNB people from other states to move to New York. We should be a national haven and leader for TGNCNB rights, equality, and dignity.

Ultimately, no executive order can take away the inherent humanity and dignity of transgender, gender-nonconforming, and non-binary people. LID has always stood for justice for our queer and trans community in Brooklyn and beyond, and will continue to stand strong no matter what this administration throws at us.