On the final day of Pride Month, the White House released a statement that the State Department will be changing its passport guidelines. The State Department will be working on a new set of parameters that will make it easier for trans people to change their gender on their passports.
According to an article from CNN, People applying for passports will now have the option of selecting their preferred gender and if they’re changing their gender from a previous passport, medical confirmation will no longer be required to issue the change.
Furthermore, the State Department is also looking into adding more changes for other people within the LGBTQ community. New plans will seek to allow passport-holders to define themselves as non-binary, intersex, and gender non-conforming.
Alphonso David, the President of the HRC, praised the State Department for their new inclusivity measures, stating “The Human Rights Campaign commends the State Department for advancing a new policy to allow non-binary, intersex and gender non-conforming Americans to obtain a passport that accurately reflects their gender identity and for updating the existing policy to modernize the process for updating gender markers…”
He continued by saying, “This is an important step towards achieving meaningful progress for LGBTQ equality in America, and will empower and enable millions of citizens to travel domestically and internationally with greater confidence that the United States recognizes their gender identity.”
However, the announcement also makes clear that this kind of overhaul to the US passport system is no small measure, and so a widespread rollout of the new policies might take some time to reach a national level.
