The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court on Friday to block a lower court order forcing the government to issue passports based on “gender identity.”
Judge Julia E. Kobick, a Biden appointee, issued an order in June directing the federal government to allow transgender-identifying citizens to choose their own sex designation.
“The Constitution does not prohibit the government from defining sex in terms of an individual’s biological classification,” the application states.
“U.S. passports are official government documents, addressed to foreign nations,” the application states. “The Executive Order in this case is an exercise of power conferred on the President both by the Constitution and by statute to determine the contents of U.S. passports.”
The First Circuit Court of Appeals declined Sept. 4 to block Kobick’s order, arguing that the government failed to engage with the lower court’s analysis that the policy was rooted in “unconstitutional animus toward transgender Americans.”
President Donald Trump’s day one executive order on gender ideology stated that passports should “accurately reflect the holder’s sex. “During the Biden administration, the State Department announced it would offer passports with an “X” gender designation and allow applicants to choose their own gender.