Ted Eytan (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Since returning to the presidency, Donald Trump has issued a wave of executive orders that target transgender people. We all knew it was coming, but feeling each one wash over us like a blast of waste water is still agonizing.
He’s playing to his anti-trans base, hoping they’ll overlook the high price of eggs as long as some trans people take a beating. As of this writing, these orders affecting trans people involve military personnel, federal government employees, minors seeking gender-affirming health care, student athletes, people seeking information about trans people in schools or on government websites, and anyone who tries to update their federal documentation to reflect their correct gender.
On his first day in office, Trump issued an executive order insisting that the federal government only recognize two genders, male and female. Without a shred of scientific understanding, he commanded that gender be determined “at conception.” In fact, at conception, an embryo has no gender.
Yet under this interpretation, every trans person who tries to get their passport or other federal documents updated could be denied or have their gender marker forcefully changed. Having the wrong gender marker on documentation can be emotionally damaging and dangerous for travelers who rightfully fear being stopped by authorities for having a gender marker that does not match their presentation.
Beyond the documentation issue, Trump has also denied trans service members the right to serve their country in an executive order that directly attacked their character, referring to the choice to transition as a “falsehood” that is “inconsistent” with “a soldier’s commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle.” In doing so, he has created a terrifying new precedent, implying trans people cannot be trusted in any position of power.
Additional executive orders have involved denying federal funds to medical facilities that provide gender-affirming health care to those under nineteen and denying federal funds to schools that allow trans women and girls to participate in female sports. Both of these changes are now facing protests, lawsuits, and opposition from medical, political, and educational communities.
In New York, State Attorney General Letitia James is pushing back, telling hospitals to continue offering gender-affirming care for trans minors. But while that opposition is welcome, the slope we’re on is still too slippery. Some major hospitals around the country are already conceding to the executive order and halting care.
The far right is praising the anti-trans executive orders. Representative Nancy Mace, Republican of South Carolina, repeatedly used an anti-trans slur during a congressional committee hearing. Government websites have been scrubbed of information regarding trans people, an action eerily similar to the first book burnings by the Nazis who destroyed countless texts on trans, gender diverse, and sexually marginalized people. The hate is showing, and all signs are pointing toward things getting worse.
Trump has additionally allowed Elon Musk, head of the newly created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), to access computer systems containing highly sensitive information on millions of Americans, including that of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Access to this data could potentially allow him or other government officials to find trans people who received treatment through Medicare and Medicaid or other resources that receive federal funding, though there is no evidence that this has yet occurred.
All Americans should be concerned about the President’s profligate use of executive orders to target a small minority that already faces hate and persecution. Like Representative Mace, Musk, and other anti-trans extremists, Trump seems fixated on trans people as an outlet for his aggression.
Things will likely get worse before they get better. But we also know from experience that people will fight back, as proven by the protests, lawsuits, and noncompliance occurring across the country. It doesn’t make the executive orders less painful or the fear less legitimate, but it gives us a glimmer of hope. That hope will have to be enough to help us weather the next executive order, and the ones after that.
This column was produced for Progressive Perspectives, a project of The Progressive magazine, and distributed by Tribune News Service.