Secretary of State Marco Rubio has ordered the US State Department to immediately suspend all applications for passports with the “X” gender marker, a third option introduced by the agency under the Biden administration for nonbinary, intersex and other gender nonconforming persons.
An internal email first reported by The Guardian documented the move. It orders the suspension of any passport applications for persons who did not mark either “male” or “female” in the gender section. It also identifies biological sex as the term that will be used going forward, noting: “The policy of the United States is that an individual’s sex is not changeable.”
Active requests for the agency to change gender markers on existing passports were also halted.
It’s a decision in line with an executive order issued by President Donald Trump this week directing the federal government to halt recognition of gender identies, part of the war on “wokeness” and the acceptance of transgender rights by the previous administration. That order, described as efforts to prevent “eradicat[ion of] the biological reality of sex,” is a broad swipe at any recognition of transgender persons other than their sex at birth.
“The erasure of sex in language and policy has a corrosive impact not just on women but on the validity of the entire American system. Basing Federal policy on truth is critical to scientific inquiry, public safety, morale, and trust in government itself,” claims Trump’s order.
Rubio’s directive at the State Department will not suspend any currently-active passports, and those issued with the new markers under Biden’s presidency will not expire in the next four years. But the policy will require those persons with “X” gender passports to mark either male or female when they do seek renewal of their passports if the policy has not reverted.
Passports with the “X” marker were first issued by the agency in April of 2022, with a 10-year lifespan. It isn’t known exactly how many Americans applied for those passports or completed applications to have their gender changed on their passports in the months following.
Lambda Legal, a legal group specializing in LGBT civil rights cases, told The Intercept that the new policy “will certainly be challenged.”
“Their appalling approach denies science and will make life immeasurably harder for intersex, nonbinary, and of course, transgender people,” the group’s director added in a statement.
The group began a legal battle over the issue in 2015 after an intersex person (naturally born with characteristics of both or neither gender) requested a passport without male or female gender markers, but was denied.
The battle persisted through the first Trump administration and into Biden’s first year in office, when the agency announced it would begin issuing “X” gender markers.
The webpage on the agency’s website marking that announcement was taken down this week, according to a review of screenshots.
Rubio was the first Trump Cabinet secretary to be confirmed, breezing through a unanimous vote this week just hours after the president was sworn in.
He’s due to make his first foreign trip around the end of the month, news reports revealed on Wednesday. He will head through Central America as his boss rolls out a massive plan to curb both legal and illegal migration to the US through the southern border.
