1:38The U.S. Supreme Court is pictured in Washington, November 4, 2025. Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images
On Thursday, the Supreme Court authorized the Trump administration to proceed with fresh regulations mandating that all U.S. passports indicate a citizen’s sex designated at birth, as opposed to their specified gender identity.
The court’s 6-3 determination, delivered by its conservative bloc, overturns prior decisions by two lower courts and the assertions of transgender individuals that the revised policy is unlawful, biased, and exposes them to tangible harm, notably while traveling.
Since 1992, individuals requesting passports have been able to receive documentation exhibiting gender indicators reflective of their preferred gender identification — when divergent from the sex recognized at birth — by offering doctor verification confirming their undergoing of clinical interventions for gender transition.
"Presenting passport bearers’ sex at birth does not contravene equal safeguard principles more than presenting their nation of origin — in both scenarios, the Government is simply validating a historical fact without exposing any person to discriminatory handling," the Supreme Court articulated in an unauthored, provisional judgment.
Those challenging the novel policy "have been unable to demonstrate that the Government's resolution to exhibit biological sex 'lacks any rationale beyond a naked … aspiration to injure a politically unpopular demographic," the judgment stated.
The US Supreme Court is seen in Washington, November 4, 2025.Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images
Legal proceedings based on the merits are still progressing through subordinate courts, yet the high court’s majority reasoned the Trump administration is "likely to prevail."
In a powerfully worded dissent, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, supported by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, accused her fellow justices of failing to equitably treat transgender individuals.
"By hindering transgender citizens from obtaining passports matching their gender, the Government is engaging in more than merely communicating its conviction that transgender identity is 'false,'" Jackson penned. "The Passport Policy also gives rise to the intrusive, and occasionally demeaning, further scrutiny that these claimants have undergone" when passing through TSA airport security checkpoints.
"The substantiated, tangible harms to these litigants evidently outweigh the Government's unexplained (and baffling) stake in the prompt execution of the Passport Policy," the dissent conveyed.
Jon Davidson, the senior legal representative for the ACLU’s LGBTQ & HIV Project, characterized the court’s deed as a "devastating blow for the autonomy of all individuals to be genuine, and adds fuel to the antagonism the Trump administration is generating against transgender individuals and their constitutional entitlements."
"Pressuring transgender individuals to possess passports that involuntarily reveal their identity escalates the prospect that they will encounter mistreatment and brutality, compounding the substantial obstacles they already encounter in securing independence, security, and validation. We will persist in challenging this policy and striving for a horizon where no one is refused self-governance over their own identity," Davidson articulated in a declaration.
Sourse: abcnews.go.com
