Rubio asks staff to freeze passport applications with ‘X’ sex markers | Trump administration

The US State Department has frozen all applications for passports with ‘X’ sex markers and changes to gender identity on existing passports, following a new executive order signed by Donald Trump on his first day in office. mandate.

In an internal cable obtained by the Guardian, Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Thursday directed department staff to enforce strict new official documentation guidelines.

“It is United States policy that an individual’s gender cannot be changed,” the email said.

The Rubio directive states that “sex, not gender, must be used” in official documents, including passports and consular certificates of birth abroad.

State Department staff were ordered Thursday to “suspend any application requesting sex marker . The policy affects current and future passport applications.

The executive order, titled “Defending Women from Ideological Gender Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government,” requires that government-issued identity documents exclusively use “an individual’s immutable biological classification as a whether man or woman.

The State Department began issuing passports with the third gender non-binary identification “X” in April 2022. Passports with the identification “X” are still valid, although issues will arise during renewals, a the White House told the Notus news site. According to Rubio’s email, “advice on existing passports containing sex marker X will come via other channels.”

It is unclear how many passports currently use the “X” option.