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The biggest news of this week — something I will not really be discussing here because I’m not sure why anyone is debating what can happen when someone lives their life in service of encouraging violence and hatred against other people — spurred some hateful rhetoric regarding trans lives. We know this kind of rhetoric sometimes leads to further violence against our communities, and it makes sense to be concerned about how these kinds of claims might impact our daily lives. I’m grateful for the work of journalists and media analysts who swiftly stepped in to show the actual facts of the situation and shut the unverified claims down. Beyond that, the past week brought on a lot more resistance from trans people and their allies, especially in the courts, but it also brought with it some potential new dangers for us that we’ll be tracking.
A Win Against Trump’s Anti-Trans Passport Policy
Following an earlier injunction against the Trump administration’s decision to cut trans people off from receiving passports with their correct gender markers, the administration filed a lawsuit arguing they have the right to ban trans people from changing their documents. The administration brought an appeal against the injunction to the First U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston last week.
As we’ve seen in many courts around the country, judges have been showing up for trans rights, and this situation was no different. The judge who presided over the administration’s appeal against the injunction has once again deemed the administration’s passport ban “unconstitutional” and reflected “animus toward transgender Americans.” In the decision, George L. Russell III, the district’s chief judge, wrote, “Like every other court that has considered this Executive Order, the Court finds its stated purpose does not serve an important governmental interest that is exceedingly persuasive. Further, the discriminatory means employed are not substantially related to the achievement of those objectives.” This marks the second time an injunction has been placed against the administration’s order against proper access to legal documents for trans people.
A U.S. State Department spokesperson responded to the second injunction by saying, “We believe that the President Trump’s Executive Order 14168, titled ‘Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government,’ is factually and legally sound, and that the district court erroneously relied on an untenable equal protection theory that is inconsistent with controlling Supreme Court authorities. Notably, this is a very narrow opinion, applying by its terms only to a few individual plaintiffs. We will be discussing all our options with the Department of Justice.” It seems as if they’re learning slowly that there are just some areas of the law where they can’t do whatever they want and get away with it.
The next steps regarding the ban are still up in the air so this fight isn’t over yet, but this represents a larger pro-trans rights trend happening in District Courts across the U.S. And no matter what happens, we should stay vigilant and wait to see if this will make it to the Supreme Court.
Some Good Trans News For Once
Their play was cancelled by the University—these college students are putting it on anyway. After a production of the play Boy My Greatness by Zoe Senese-Grossberg was canceled at the University of Oklahoma due to its “defiance” of Oklahoma’s state law banning anything that promotes equity, diversity, and inclusion, a group of students have launched a GoFundMe to promote and put on the play on their own without the university’s help.
Judge blocks Trump administration’s subpoena of trans kids’ medical records from Boston hospital. Some more good news out of Boston Children’s Hospital, one of the only state-funded gender-affirming care clinics in the country that is refusing to bow to Trump’s orders that they must stop providing care to trans youth. When will the administration learn they shouldn’t mess with Massachusetts? At this point, they’re just asking for losses.
Pope Leo XIV to follow doctrine of “openness and welcome” for LGBTQ+ community. The Catholic Church sucks and we all know it, but I do think it’s important that religious leaders stand against the virulent hatred and backlash we’re experiencing right now. If for nothing else, it makes the members of those churches rethink their own stances for a minute, even if they don’t adopt the stances of their leaders.
‘Blatantly unconstitutional’: Second Amendment groups slam floated gun ban for transgender Americans. As a trans person who made it my business to learn how to use a gun over the last year, the fact that the National Rifle Association (NRA) is sticking up for our rights to use them has been making me laugh on and off for the last week. What’s that thing they say about broken clocks again?
Rally planned as Tacoma’s children hospital limits trans gender-affirming care and Trans advocates rally against U of M Health’s decision to end gender-affirming care for minors. People in Washington held a “Rally to Defend Trans Kids” in response to Tacoma’s MultiCare Mary Bridge Children Hospital’s decision to stop providing gender-affirming care for trans youth. Meanwhile, people in Michigan are standing up against the University of Michigan’s Michigan Medicine’s decision to do the same thing. More of this! More of this!
Stand with Trans hotline offers help, virtual hugs for transgender kids, their families. Another win for Michigan: A group in Detroit has launched their own trans support hotline for trans youth and their advocates in the wake of the Trump administration destroying the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline’s LGBTQ+ Youth Specialized Services program.
Manhattan school board rescinds trans youth sports measure. Schools in New York City are now being advised and gently pushed to make gender-inclusion a top priority in their youth sports programs as a result of pushback from parents. You read that right: parents.
Supreme Court lets transgender student in South Carolina continue using boys’ bathroom at school for now. Not fully good news but not bad news, either, considering more and more bathroom bans are being brought to the floors of state legislatures everywhere. As a person from Florida, it’s always great to see Southern states push back against anti-trans legislation.
State to pay $85,000 to LGBTQ+ students forced to leave Iowa Capitol in 2020. Following their expulsion from the Iowa State Capitol after protesting a bathroom bill, a group of students sued the state in 2022. Their lawsuit has finally come to a conclusion with the state having to pay financial restitution to all 150 of them.
International Trans News:
Trans people must be allowed ID reflecting lived gender, EU court adviser says. Huge news for anyone living in Europe with a European Union passport: No matter where they live or what their country says about trans rights, those countries are legally obligated as an EU member state to issue passports that reflect the correct gender markers to their trans citizens.
Cuba’s trans people see legal progress with new gender ID law. I reported on Cuba’s new pro-trans legislation in a previous Trans New Tracker, but I think this profile about how laws that support correct legal identification for trans people can and do improve our lives and expand our ability to move freely through the various bureaucracies we’re all forced to contend with is important for everyone to read.
Trans News I Wish I Didn’t Have to Report
House HHS Appropriations Bill Would Devastate Trans Adult Healthcare Nationwide. A new Health and Human Services appropriations bill making its way to the House is attempting to gut healthcare for trans people in a similar way the earliest version of the Trump administration’s “Big Beautiful Bill Act” was originally intended to. The bill takes aim at trans healthcare funding made through Medicaid and Medicare and states, “None of the funds made available by this Act may be used for any social, psychological, behavioral, or medical intervention performed for the purposes of intentionally changing the body of an individual (including by disrupting the body’s development, inhibiting its natural functions, or modifying its appearance) to no longer correspond to the individual’s biological sex.” While the Senate version of this bill doesn’t include this language, it’s still important to track how the House bill moves through the legislature.
Alabama libraries could stop children from seeing books that ‘positively depict’ transgender people. This one is especially shocking because it’s not coming from the state — it’s coming from the Alabama Public Library Service.
Video of clash over gender-identity content in Texas A&M children’s lit class leads to firing, removals. By now, you’ve probably seen the viral video of that one loser student calling out their professor over the supposed inclusion of “gender ideology” in class. Sadly, this is the inevitable outcome of the video’s creation and its virality, despite the fact that the professor and the department’s members were simply doing their jobs and doing the right thing. I don’t know what else to say…I’m sick of this shit.
Malcolm Gladwell says he’s ‘ashamed’ of being ‘cowed’ into supporting trans athletes in women’s sports. Gladwell has been on my “Enemies List” since at least 2016, and I think it’s time he’s on everyone else’s, too. What a fucking loser.
Last Bits
Amid anti-trans sports bans, Tucson Roller Derby builds safe space for LGBTQIA+ athletes. I love how roller derby and the people who participate in it are constantly on the right side of history when it comes to almost anything happening in this country.
Who’s afraid of Jinkx Monsoon? Just a truly great profile of the inimitable Jinkx Monsoon, whose starring role in the Tony-winning Broadway hit, Oh, Mary!, is sadly coming to an end very soon.
Nancy Mace melts down after colleague mentions ‘boob jobs’. God, this was really funny. Sometimes we just have to laugh at these buffoons. They deserve it.
Charlie Kirk’s legacy deserves no mourning. Can’t even believe we have to keep saying this, honestly.
Post this onto your feed on instagram please. This is incredibly important news.