Transgender community faced with legal document hurdles
In January, President Trump issued an executive order stating that the federal government recognizes only two sexes, male and female.
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The U.S. State Department then eliminated the X gender as an option and stopped allowing transgender, intersex, and nonbinary people to change the sex field on their passports.
The ACLU and other plaintiffs sued the Trump administration, arguing that the policy violated the Constitution and the Administrative Procedure Act.
A federal judge in Boston granted a preliminary injunction. The ruling means that six transgender and nonbinary plaintiffs can obtain passports reflecting their gender identity.
While the case makes its way through the courts, Allie Bohm, with the New York Civil Liberties Union says 'one of the things people have been doing is going out and getting a REAL ID now in New York and in other states that will recognize the gender identity so that they have an accurate gender marker.'
More: Latest News from Around the Tri-State
Taylor Hubbard, who is transmasculine, told PIX11 News, 'It is helpful to have a document that says, and affirms who I am. If I go to a bar and I'm dressed up very masculine, and they see my driver's license and they see female, at that point they now know I'm trans, and so it can also be a safety issue.'
Robert Vitelli, the CEO of the LGBT Network, said, 'This country was based on freedom … what we're seeing is a rollback of true American values in terms of who were are.'
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