On the very first day of President Donald Trump’s second term, the White House issued an executive order, “Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.” The order made clear that, from here on out, the federal government will recognize two biological sexes, male and female, a person will only be identified in the manner of their biological sex and that “‘Sex’ is not a synonym for and does not include the concept of ‘gender identity.’”
This executive order, which essentially erases the concept of transgender and non-binary (as well as intersex) people from all federal government agencies, was one of many attacks on the trans community to come in the following weeks. Soon after, Marco Rubio ordered the State Department to stop issuing new passports with gender marker changes or with an “X” gender marker, a marker typically used by non-binary or intersex individuals. This affected any person seeking a new or renewed passport after Inauguration Day and people with active passport applications.
Trump has also signed orders banning trans women from women’s sports, opening the door for the reinstatement of the ban on transgender military service members, and halting federal funding for gender-affirming care for any person under the age of 19, among many others. One of his most recent actions has been the removal of references to transgender people from the Stonewall National Monument and the monument’s website, including the removal of the “T” and later “Q+” from the LGBTQ+ acronym on information sources surrounding the monument.
Trump’s efforts are calculated, sending a clear message to the American people. His administration not only plans to make sure transgender people cannot live the lives they want to or make the choices they want to make about their bodies or how they want to be treated in society, but they also want to write trans people out of American life completely.
And it’s not enough that trans and non-binary people who are still alive are erased; the history of those who came before them cannot be told either.
The barrage of executive orders, statements, and future policy change threats is frightening. The past few weeks have been incredibly stressful, and I’ve had to disable my daily news updates from the New York Times, as the nightly email would keep me from sleeping at night, and the morning headlines would cause too much despair for me to get out of bed for class.
Trans people have also seen this coming. Trump’s advertisements throughout his campaign have signaled that he will not hold back on his hatred towards the trans community. My Instagram and Reddit feeds have been full of trans people seeking help and guidance on the uncertain future of trans healthcare and documentation since before Election Day. While Trump’s actions are shocking, they are not surprising. Trans people are a minority that Trump knows he can attack so he can distract his base from realizing that he is not actually delivering on his campaign promises and instead keep the media saturated with “culture war” content.
In the midst of all of this strife, it feels natural for trans people across America to lose hope completely. It’s easy to just wallow in despair as headline after headline tells you that your country does not care about you but instead only cares about making your life harder and more miserable. But now, of all times, is not the time to give in. Trans people have always existed, and while it feels like we’re being written out now, there was a long period where we weren’t written in in the first place. Gender marker changes on official documents were only allowed in the 1980s, and the “X” marker was only introduced in 2017. Of course, it is incredibly far from ideal to have to be recognized as the wrong gender by the federal government. Still, it is essential to know that even a few decades ago, trans people lived and made names for themselves even though a few documents didn’t recognize them.
I’m not writing this article to echo the tone-deaf optimism that I have seen and heard during the first month of this administration. No, everything will not just be the same. While this administration will eventually end, “This too shall pass” isn’t exactly helpful. However, this article is also not echoing the apocalyptic fear-mongering that has come out of the last few weeks either. The world is not about to end. While things will change, and life will likely get harder, we will persist. The trans community will not fade out of existence. We survived one Trump term; we will do it again. I genuinely do believe in the statement, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.” To the trans people of Carleton: we need you, we appreciate you and we will come out of this stronger, happier and more united than ever.
