by Julia Robins ‘20

Since Trump has came into power, he has removed federal protections for transgender children in schools, attempted to ban them from the military, and has forced transgender inmates into prisons based on their birth-assigned sex. Discrimination was one thing. But now the Trump Administration is trying to define intersex people out of existence.

The New York Times leaked a memo from the White House announcing that the Department of Health and Human Services plans to define gender and sex under Title IX of Federal Civil Rights laws, the 1972 law that prohibits gender-based discrimination. Claiming that gender is “a biological, immutable condition determined by genitalia at birth,” the Trump administration is claiming that gender is cannot be changed after one’s birth. The government is basically claiming that transgender people don’t even exist.

Such a proposal eradicates federal recognition of 1.4 million Americans that are transgender who will lose legal protection. For those who are intersex and battling gender identity, they could potentially lose the right to have a passport, driver’s license, and would be denied health care. Trump’s administration is denying science. Millions- currently estimated 3 million- are born with a mixture of male and female sexual characteristics, and have an irregular chromosome pattern. Intersexuality is real and proven by science- the government cannot just pretend to ignore intersex individuals who are human and equal.

The White House needs to promote unity and inclusiveness, not divide the country by trying to erase citizens from definition. The government is supposed to represent all citizens, and that includes LGBTQ+ groups. This plan is an attack on humanity itself, destroying one of the fundamentals of self-identification.