The director of the Office of Personnel Management must also ensure that personnel records report federal employees’ sex according to the same definition.
The order requires that federal taxpayer money not be used to fund “transition services”. A few federal prison inmates have had gender-affirming surgery and more have had treatments such as hormone therapy paid for with federal funds.
The order will also block the requirement that transgender people at government facilities and workplaces be referred to by pronouns that align with their gender. Trump’s team says those requirements violate the First Amendment’s freedom of speech and religion.
Although the order does not explicitly issue a nationwide mandate on which bathrooms transgender people can use or which sports competitions they can join, it does state that government agencies should take action to ensure that “intimate spaces” are designated by sex and not identity.
Trump’s order says the Biden administration’s position requiring gender identity-based access to intimate spaces was based on a misapplication of a Supreme Court decision and that it had “harmed women”.
Some have interpreted this to mean that transgender employees at federal government departments and agencies will have to go back to using public bathrooms according to the sex of their birth.
A second order, “Ending radical and wasteful government DEI programs and preferencing”, aims to terminate federal programs related to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) that were expanded under the Biden administration.
Several other orders that touch on LGBTQ rights were also rescinded, including one that Biden introduced reversing a previous Trump order that had allowed restrictions on transgender people serving in the military.
What will change for LGBTQ communities in the US?
Those primarily affected by Trump’s gender order will be people who do not conform to a binary understanding of sex, including transgender and non-binary people, as well as intersex people who have genitals, chromosomes or reproductive organs that cross over the biological male/female definition.
People who identify as female but whose birth certificate says are male will probably be transferred to male prisons and vice versa. “X” will no longer be a gender option on government documents including passports (a Trump official said this won’t affect existing passport holders), and there will no longer be regulation stating employers cannot discriminate against employees with LGBTQ+ identities.
According to the US Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey taken between January and April 2024, about 1.1 per cent of the adult population, or about 3 million people, identified as transgender.
Another 1.5 per cent did not strictly identify as male, female or transgender. These individuals may use terms such as non-binary or gender non-conforming to describe their gender identity.
What has been the reaction in the US?
Conservative groups such as the American Family Association are praising the change as one that “acknowledges the truth”. But experts including the American Medical Association and American Psychiatric Association hold that gender is a spectrum, not a binary structure consisting only of male and female.
Responding to the executive orders concerning LGBTQ rights, Human Rights Campaign, an American LGBTQ advocacy group, said the president’s directives did not have authority to override the US Constitution, federal statutes or established legal precedent.
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“Many of these directives do just that or are regarding matters over which the president does not have control,” it said, noting that one part of the gender order in particular appears to defy a Supreme Court ruling.
Given that, the advocacy group said many of the orders would be difficult to implement and would be challenged through litigation.
“We refuse to back down or be intimidated,” said Kelley Robinson, president of the Human Rights Campaign. “We are not going anywhere, and we will fight back against these harmful provisions with everything we’ve got.”
How were the Biden administration’s policies gender-inclusive?
Former president Joe Biden’s gender policies were effectively the opposite of Trump’s. Some of Biden’s gender-inclusive policies included:
- Revoking Trump’s 2018 ban on transgender military personnel and recruits;
- Directing agencies to implement a Supreme Court’s decision (Bostock v. Clayton County) which found that discrimination based on sex extended to discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, which is in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
- Directing agencies to advance equity for underserved populations, including LGBTQ+ people;
- Creating a White House council to advance gender equity, including for LGBTQ+ people;
- Support for the Equality Act, which would have provided protections against discrimination for LGBTQ+ people. It passed the House of Representatives with 224 to 206 votes but did not pass the Senate;
- A push for inclusion in federal data collection. The US Census Bureau began including questions regarding sexual orientation and gender identity in its surveys in 2021;
- Protecting and expanding access to healthcare for LGBTQ+ individuals.
What is the difference between gender and sex?
In short, sex typically refers to biological characteristics while gender is more about social roles, identity and expression.
The World Health Organisation defines gender as the characteristics of people (“women, men, girls and boys”) that are socially constructed. This, it says, includes norms, behaviours and roles associated with being a person, as well as relationships with each other.
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“As a social construct, gender varies from society to society and can change over time,” it says.
“Gender interacts with but is different from sex, which refers to the different biological and physiological characteristics of females, males and intersex persons, such as chromosomes, hormones and reproductive organs.
“Gender and sex are related to, but different from, gender identity. Gender identity refers to a person’s deeply felt, internal and individual experience of gender, which may or may not correspond to the person’s physiology or designated sex at birth.”
AP and staff writers