LGBTQ advocacy and civil rights organizations have found that Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton was behind the Texas Department of Public Safety’s recent policy change that blocks transgender Texans from altering their gender markers on state-issued IDs and driver’s licenses.
The change, which effectively halts the department from accepting court orders for this purpose, was unveiled last week through an internal memo accompanied by an additional order for staff to compile the names of people who requested the modification.
This is not the first such request. In 2022, Texas DPS received a similar order from Paxton’s office for a list of individuals who had changed their gender markers on their driver’s licenses within the prior two years.
According to reports, DPS officials told the attorney general’s office that the data did not exist and could not be produced accurately. They declined to confirm who was behind the request.
“We do know now that it is related that the attorney general has ordered DPS to track this information to give it to him,” Ash Hall, policy & advocacy strategist on LGBTQIA+ Rights for the ACLU of Texas, said. “We still don’t know what he wants to do with the information on that list.”
Hall noted that since news of the policy change came to light, there has been a lot of confusion and anxiety for transgender Texans.
“It’s becoming increasingly hostile to just exist and have a basic quality of life,” Joelle Bayaa-Uzuri Espeut, director of programming at The Normal Anomaly Initiative, Inc. said. “There’s this overwhelming sense of fear from a community who literally just want to live their life. This came out of nowhere.”
Espeut — a transgender woman herself — cited continued attacks against transgender individuals within the state including limiting access to gender-affirming care and continued discrimination against them.
Espeut noted that the department was not altering the policy for name changes on state-issued IDS or driver’s licenses as people often request modifications after getting married or if they go by a nickname.
“This is a clear target against the trans community and transgender people because [DPS officials] are saying that they will update gender if it’s a clerical error and they are not stopping name changes as of yet,” she said.
The department has also removed a direct link (it can still be accessed through the back page) to amend an individual’s birth certificate from the state agency’s website.
Espeut took issue with the updated policy's timing as Texas politicians enforce Senate Bill 1, a law that sets new rules for voting by mail, increases the participation of partisan poll watchers and decreases methods that aim to make voting more accessible.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott announced earlier this week that more than one million “illegitimate” Texas voters have been removed from the state’s voter rolls since 2021.
“This is a form of voter suppression with trans people not having identification that affirms their gender identity,” Espeut said. “They are less likely to do things like engage in voting because they don’t want to have an uncomfortable situation at the polls. This has far more reaching implications than simply updating their gender marker on their ID.”
According to Hall, the ACLU of Texas is looking into these concerns, as they said it would be “very illuminating” to the electorate.
Hall noted that modifying these official documents has always been difficult, especially since Texas does not have a statute requiring judges to issue these court orders.
“Some judges won’t allow a gender change, and some will. “Oftentimes, trans Texans have had to travel to find basically the right court in order to get those changes,” Hall said. “So, it’s never been particularly easy in the first place, and now it’s become even more difficult to navigate this.”
In Texas, the first step to obtaining a gender marker change is to get a court order, and then an individual can submit their request.
Those wanting to apply for this alternation now can still get a court order, but the ACLU of Texas is recommending that people file separately for name changes and hold off on submitting gender marker changes. Until the organization knows what the list is being compiled for, they want people to remain off it.
Hall said there are issues regarding how the policy came about that extend past its content. No public notice was given, and Texas residents were not given an opportunity to weigh in on the matter. Agencies such as the DPS are also not supposed to be able to deny court orders.
Hall described the policy change as “definitely not” legal. The ACLU of Texas is examining ways to respond and how it could block the policy from being in effect.
“It’s really important to have IDs that accurately reflect who we are,” Hall said. “When we are put in situations where we have to show our driver’s licenses to strangers and that person doesn’t see what they’re expecting, it has the potential to out transgender people to that stranger.”
“It opens us up to discrimination, harassment and even violence,” they added.
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