The state of Texas has enacted a policy that bars transgender people from changing the sex listed on their driver’s licenses.
According to The Texas Newsroom, Texans will be unable to change the sex on their license unless they are doing so to correct a clerical error, a policy change that was rolled out this week. Investigative reporter Lauren McGaughy, who broke the story, said in a Wednesday post on X that the change “was instituted, quietly, yesterday and is in effect.” McGaughy confirmed the policy change with Sheri Gipson, the chief of the Driver License Division at the Texas Department of Public Safety.
The Texas Newsroom additionally obtained an email from an unnamed agency employee, which stated, “Effective immediately, August 20, 2024, the Department will not accept court orders or amended birth certificates issued that change the sex when it differs from documentation already on file.”
According to the Texas Newsroom, the email also stated that if division employees receive requests for sex marker updates, they should forward copies of those requests to an email address with the subject line “Sex Change Court Order.”
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It’s not clear why Texas enacted the policy now. Per The Texas Newsroom, Texans were previously able to change the sex listed on their driver’s license by presenting a court order or an amended birth certificate. Even though there was previously no policy in the state against changing one’s sex marker, that bureaucratic process has been exploited for potentially sinister ends.
In 2022, the Washington Post reported that Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton had requested that the Texas Department of Public Safety compile a list of the “total number of changes from male to female and female to male for the last 24 months” on their driver’s licenses. The Texas DPS did not provide that data to Paxton’s office, stating that there was no way to separate the correction of clerical errors from data on trans people.
That same year, Paxton released an opinion claiming that gender-affirming care for minors “can legally constitute child abuse.” Governor Greg Abbott then used that opinion to direct state agencies to investigate families of trans children for “child abuse.” As of March 30, that order was blocked by an appeals court.
Brad Pritchett, the interim CEO of Equality Texas, pointed out in a press release that there are 92,000 trans adults in Texas.
“Just like people who change their names after marriage want their correct name on their license, trans Texans want their driver’s license to reflect their gender,” Pritchett said. “We use our IDs to navigate all areas of life, driving, voting, employment. Having an ID that reflects who you are is a basic form of dignity that many take for granted.”
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