Supreme Court allows Trump to block use of ‘X’ passport marker for trans and nonbinary people

WASHINGTON, DC: A major victory for President Donald Trump. On Thursday, November 7, the Supreme Court cleared the way for his plan to restrict passport gender designations to birth sex.

The Court lifted a lower court’s pause on the policy, effectively allowing the administration to move forward with requiring passports to list only “male” or “female,” based on a person’s sex at birth. The ruling temporarily blocks the “X” gender marker introduced under former President Joe Biden’s administration in 2021.

Supreme Court clears way for Trump to end gender choice on passports

The order, issued 6-3 along ideological lines, lets Trump’s policy take effect while legal challenges proceed in lower courts, according to NPR. The unsigned order stated, “Displaying passport holders’ sex at birth no more offends equal protection principles than displaying their country of birth.” It added that the government was “merely attesting to a historical fact without subjecting anyone to differential treatment.”

Trump signed an executive order on his first day back in office recognizing only two sexes, undoing several measures related to transgender rights and diversity, equity, and inclusion policies enacted under Biden.

US Attorney General Pam Bondi celebrated the ruling, posting on X, “Today’s stay allows the government to require citizens to list their biological sex on their passport. In other words: there are two sexes, and our attorneys will continue fighting for that simple truth.”

White House spokesperson Anna Kelly told CNN the decision was “a victory for common sense and President Trump, who was resoundingly elected to eliminate woke gender ideology from our federal government.”

New policy reverses decades of allowing passports to reflect gender identity

Gender markers were first added to U.S. passports in 1976. For more than three decades, Americans could request a passport that reflected their gender identity rather than their birth certificate.

Earlier this year, a federal judge in Massachusetts halted Trump’s proposed policy, ruling that it likely violated the Equal Protection Clause. The administration appealed, arguing the lower court “had no basis in law or logic” for blocking the rule.

By lifting that pause, the Supreme Court now allows the Trump administration to enforce the birth-sex rule while litigation continues. The decision marks another reversal of Biden-era protections for transgender Americans, setting the stage for broader political and legal battles in the months ahead.