(Photographed by Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images News)
Staff Writer: Skyler Pereyra
Email: spereyra@umassd.edu
Since Donald J. Trump’s victory in the November 2024 election and his inauguration on January 20th, marginalized groups and communities have grown increasingly concerned about the laws and policies enacted and those expected to be implemented.
The Transgender community is one of many the president has been attacking, and it continues to worsen with each passing week.
A majority of the ideas being pressed through our government regarding trans people have been coming from President Trump’s Executive Orders (EO). An EO is defined by ACLU as a “written directive, signed by the president, that orders the government to take specific actions to ensure the laws be faithfully executed.”
On his first day in office, President Trump passed the EO “Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.”
This EO details that the United States is being threatened by an “attack against the ordinary and longstanding use and understanding of biological and scientific terms, replacing the immutable biological reality of sex with an internal, fluid, and subjective sense of self unmoored from biological facts.”
Section 2 of the EO establishes definitions that the federal government will officially recognize and enforce regarding certain words. For example, the EO states that the word “sex” “shall refer to an individual’s immutable biological classification as either male or female.”
They also provide definitions for female (“a person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the large reproductive cell”) and male (“a person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the small reproductive cell”).
On January 27th, 2025, he signed EO “Prioritizing Military Excellence and Readiness,” reinstating the policy from his previous term that former President Joe Biden expelled at the start of his term.
It states, “It is the policy of the United States Government to establish high standards for troop readiness, lethality, cohesion, honesty, humility, uniformity, and integrity. This policy is inconsistent with the medical, surgical, and mental health constraints on individuals with gender dysphoria.”
If passed, it would bar “transgender people from enlisting and serving openly” in the armed services.
The day after, he signed EO “Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation,” which stated that “it is the policy of the United States that it will not fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support the so-called “transition” of a child from one sex to another.”
Luckily, this EO is now indefinitely blocked thanks to anonymous doctors from Washington, Oregon, Minnesota, and Colorado suing the Trump Administration.
Another tactic being used by Trump and his administration is the removal of transgender-related topics on official government websites and resources.
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children removed all references to transgender people, with a spokesperson explaining, “Earlier this week, like many federally funded non-profits, NCMEC was directed by DOJ to comply with Executive Order 14168. We are responding to this direction in a balanced way reviewing our publicly facing materials to ensure compliance while not impacting our 40-year mission of child protection.”
Similarly, the State Department Travel Advisory Website removed the “T” in LGBT from their page that now displays “LGB Travel Information.” Even the National Park Services removed the involvement of transgender people on the page about the Stonewall Uprisings by replacing LGBT with LGB.
The erasure of information is seen by many as an attempt to eradicate transgender identities along with important medical and historical research.
Trump is also targeting trans athletes—on February 5th, he signed the EO “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports.”
On the surface, the order calls “to protect opportunities for women and girls to compete in safe and fair sports.” Yet, the true nature is to make a distinct separation in sports between cis and transgender women.
The people in support of keeping trans women outside of sports ignore a fact pointed out by the president of the N.C.A.A (National Collegiate Athletic Association) Charlie Baker: “Out of 510,000 athletes competing at the collegiate level, there are fewer than 10 who publicly identify as transgender.”
In response to Trump’s attacks on the transgender community, the cities of Boston and Worcester have declared themselves “sanctuary cities,” meaning they will limit or deny cooperation with the national government in enforcing anti-transgender law.