July 17, 2025
Boston’s U.S. District Judge Julia Kobick blocked Trump’s anti-trans order and instated a preliminary injunction to expand the April 2025 ruling.
After a federal judge blocked the Trump administration from refusing to issue passports to transgender and nonbinary Americans, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is encouraging members of the community to get their passports in order.
After taking office in January 2025, President Donald Trump signed an executive order requiring the federal government to “recognize only two sexes, male and female,” and that “these sexes are not changeable.” Following the order, the Department of State stopped issuing passports for anything outside of the applicant’s birth-assigned sex.
However, Boston’s U.S. District Judge Julia Kobick blocked the order and recently issued a preliminary injunction to expand the ruling, according to USA Today.
The ruling in Orr v. Trump results in passports with a sex designation aligning with one’s gender identity preference or with an “X” for sex designation will be available for all persons applying for a new passport or seeking to change the sex or name on a current passport. It also applies to people who were sent a previous passport with a sex designation listed with their birth-assigned sex after applying for a new one due to Trump’s anti-trans policies.
Several ACLU leaders, such as Senior Staff Attorney for the ACLU’s LGBTQ & HIV Project Li Nowlin-Sohl, call Judge Kobick’s ruling a needed victory. “This decision is a critical victory against discrimination and for equal justice under the law,” Nowlin-Sohl said, according to an announcement on the ACLU’s website.
“But it’s also a historic win in the fight against this administration’s efforts to drive transgender people out of public life. The State Department’s policy is a baseless barrier for transgender, nonbinary, and intersex Americans and denies them the dignity we all deserve.
Jessie Rossman, legal director at the ACLU of Massachusetts, highlights how the nonprofit organization will continue to fight against disparities faced by the trans and LGBTQ+ community beyond the historic win. “This decision acknowledges the immediate and profound negative impact that the Trump administration’s passport policy has on the ability of people across the country to travel for work, school, and family,” Rossman said.
“The Trump administration’s passport policy attacks the foundations of the right to privacy and the freedom for all people to live their lives safely and with dignity. We will continue to fight to stop this unlawful policy once and for all.”
The war against the trans community by way of passports is just one attempt by the Trump administration to roll back trans rights. In May 2025, the Department of Defense took measures to ban transgender people from serving in the military, a ruling that the Supreme Court supported.
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