The Trump administration has attacked transgender Americans’ rights since the beginning, but in May, three new policy points targeted our health and safety. The Finalized Conscience Regulation and a proposed rule on Title IX interpretation from the Department of Health and Human Services and a third from the Department of Housing and Urban Development plan to remove protections extended to trans people if approved. This growing onslaught of trans-exclusionary policy isn’t just blind bigotry from our government, but a targeted campaign to further regulate us into second-class citizen status and bar us from public life.
In one of her earliest acts as secretary of education, Betsy DeVos revoked the newly won Obama-era protections for transgender students based on Title IX. This guidance from then-Secretary John B. King Jr. had instructed public schools and universities to apply Title IX regulations on the basis of gender identity, including policies concerning sexual harassment, correct identification of students according to their names and pronouns, and gender/sex segregation of students (e.g., in physical education classes and restrooms). Without these protections, already vulnerable transgender youth can be freely harassed and humiliated not just by their peers, but by their school officials.
Targeting our transgender youth is the first step in excluding trans people from public life. If we are denied access to the same education and rights as cisgender students, our lives and safety are interrupted from the very start. In many cases, it can ensure that transgender youth do not survive to become transgender adults. Take, for instance, the Virginia student who was forced to sit in the hallway while her cisgender classmates retreated to school locker rooms for safety during an active-shooter drill. Without Department of Education regulations, school officials cannot be trusted to ensure the safety of transgender students, even during the fatal mass shootings that are on the rise in our schools.
In the months and years since the inauguration in 2017, the Trump administration has waged constant attacks on the healthcare rights of transgender Americans, including repeated actions by the Department of Health and Human Services to exclude transgender people from survey methods, patient protections, and access to health care. Healthcare researchers seeking government funding were advised to avoid using seven words if they wanted to succeed. Predictably, one of these words was “transgender.”
Perhaps the most visible stance in recent months is the infamous transgender military ban. One of a host of hateful regulations spawned from tweets by the president of the United States, the policy banning transgender Americans from joining the armed forces went into effect in April. America is a society that views military service as the fulfillment of a patriotic duty among its citizens. Making an explicit policy excluding a portion of those citizens from service is clearly relegating them to a second-class status.
Even before Trump came to office, the Republican tactic du jour for legally discriminating against trans people was so-called “bathroom bills.” While, thankfully, there hasn’t been a federal attempt at such legislation, the Trump administration’s Department of Justice did withdraw its injunction against North Carolina’s H.B.2, which had begun during the Obama administration. While these bills are often shrugged off with a “let people pee in peace,” the ramifications of such legislation are infinitely more sinister: If you cannot safely use public restrooms, it means you cannot safely go to work, go to school, or shop for necessities. By denying trans people safety in public bathrooms, you are denying them access to being in public.
This is only a small taste of the pattern of anti-transgender actions taken by this administration. The full list of its foul deeds would not fit into this article. These are only part of the fuller picture of the ongoing assaults on the rights of transgender Americans that led to the three regulations released during May, each of which would prove fatal for trans people living in this country.
As part of an ongoing expansion of a so-called conscience rule from the Department of Health and Human Services, healthcare providers can choose not to provide necessary medical care for patients based on the religious stance of the provider. This would include denying transition care to patients in need. Transgender patients already face lengthy gatekeeping processes to access health care, but with this expanded rule, they could further encounter providers who flatly refuse to provide them the lifesaving treatment that they otherwise qualify for.
The Department of Housing and Urban Development released a draft of a rule that would allow shelters and other government-funded housing organizations to openly discriminate against transgender people. HUD had already removed training guidelines for shelters to support LGBTQ individuals in 2017. This further step to remove services from transgender individuals is simply evil. Transgender people face job insecurity and housing instability at levels far higher than their cisgender counterparts. In many states, a person’s gender identity is still legal grounds for firing or not hiring employees, and based on the government’s (non)enforcement of Title IX, the Fair Housing Act is unlikely to protect individuals who are discriminated against in housing decisions based on gender identity. Revoking HUD assistance from trans people who have lost their jobs and homes further places their safety at risk.
Finally, the HHS proposed a reversal of previous protections for transgender patients and patients who have had abortion care (which includes many trans individuals). This is the most recent proposal to withdraw previous protections extended by the Obama administration protecting against discrimination based on gender identity.
These policy proposals were released in the same week as the revelation that the fatal shooting of Muhlaysia Booker could be related to the murder of another black trans woman and the nonfatal stabbing of a third black trans woman, all in Dallas. The same month as the murder of black trans woman “Tamika” Michelle Washington in Philadelphia. The same month that black trans woman Claire Legato died of her injuries from a shooting in Cleveland.
Every new policy chipping away at the safety and status of transgender people in America is another attempt to erase us from society. These regulations, no matter how minor, are each an act of violence against this marginalized community, already afflicted with astonishing rates of homelessness, precarity, violence, murder, and suicide.
Looking for a ways to help? First, spread the word about actions like these taken by the government. The Trump administration has spent years chipping away at the rights of transgender Americans, and the response and support we’ve received in progressive spheres has been lackluster at best. Second, these regulations are still in the proposal stage. Submit a public comment opposing HHS proposals to limit transgender people’s access to health care. If you want a more tangible way to support trans people, you can donate to these organizations providing crucial assistance to transgender people in need.