US tells airlines to disregard ‘X’ sex markers on passports and input ‘M’ or ‘F’ | Trump administration

US Customs and Border Protection implemented a rule this week that will require airlines to disregard “X” sex markers on passports and input an “M” or “F” marker instead, sending those people with an “X” marker into panic.

“X” markers became available to US passport holders in 2022, in an effort to allow people with gender identities other than male and female to obtain more accurate travel documents.

Now, the new CBP rule has many people on social media and beyond worried that they will no longer be allowed to fly internationally.

“It’s a little bit too soon to say how this is going to practically work out,” said Andy Izenson, senior legal director at the Chosen Family Law Center.

Passports with “X” markers should still be considered valid travel documents; the US district court of Massachusetts issued an order in June ensuring that they would remain valid after the Trump administration attempted to ban them under executive order 14168, titled Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.

While the courts have continued to prevent the Trump administration from outright banning a third gender marker, this week’s rule can still serve to make the lives of trans and non-binary people more difficult, Izenson says.

“I would suggest the intent is to ensure that any individual person who’s acting under color of law or as an agent of the state has as much leeway to act out their personal bigotry as they want, without any concern about consequences,” Izenson said.

After spending time on the phone with CBP, the Transportation Security Administration and the Department of Homeland Security, Izenson was unable to get clear answers about how the rule would function, and who would be responsible for enforcing it.

Izenson said it’s questionable whether it will be up to individual agents whether they choose to flag “X” gender markers on passports that are different from the “F” and “M” markers that airlines will now be required to input, or whether the rule could prevent travelers with “X” markers from boarding international flights. Land border crossings and domestic flights should not be affected, however, per Izenson.

A CBP spokesperson said: “Foreign travelers with authorized and valid US travel documents are being processed as they were previously. New or renewing Trusted Traveler Program applicants are now required to choose one of the two approved designations, male or female, to complete the application. An applicant’s choice of sex is not criteria for an applicant’s admission into the US.”

Izenson and Carl Charles, counsel for Lambda Legal, both say they have not yet heard about the rule causing problems for people at the airport. But Dr July Pilowsky, a scientist and US citizen currently residing in Spain who uses he/they/she pronouns, said the new rule is already disrupting their life.

When Pilowsky initially chose to change their passport gender marker to “X”, they said “it was a practical decision”.

“It’s not like I did it to validate myself and feel good about myself,” Pilowsky said, noting they did it out of necessity because it can be a bureaucratic hassle when different identity documents have different information on them.

Additionally, Pilowsky said they’d already experienced trouble at the airport because of their gender expression.

“What CBP officers do when you show them your document [passport] at the border, is they look at the sex marker on your document. And based on what that sex marker says, they decide what you’re supposed to look like and what your body is supposed to be like,” Pilowsky said.

Body-scanning X-rays at airport security that reveal genitalia can be especially invasive for trans people.

“The CBP officers can decide whether the results of the body scan are suspicious or not, based on, you know, there’s something in your pants they think you shouldn’t have. So what’s on your document shapes what CBP officers believe ought to be reality,” they continued.

Pilowsky said they’ve experienced “invasive pat-downs” because of this, which is one reason why they decided to get the “X” marker.

“What I wanted to do was disrupt the process. When you have a sex marker that says ‘X’, then suddenly it’s difficult for the CBP officer to build an image of what you’re supposed to look like and compare you against it, positively or negatively,” they explained.

Now that the new rule has been implemented, they have to worry about the same problem again.

“I’ve experienced some slice of the spectrum of things you can experience if you’re under suspicion,” they said. “I don’t want to know about the rest of that spectrum.”

To avoid this, Pilowsky said, “I’m being forced into the rather absurd situation of reaching out to an immigration lawyer in order to enter my own country.” They have dual citizenship in the US and Chile, so they’re hoping to enter the US with a Chilean passport, which doesn’t have an “X” marker option, in the future.

Charles of Lambda Legal said he still considers the availability of “X” markers a victory. “People need identity documents to navigate their everyday lives,” he said.

Future legal challenges to the policy will depend on how it winds up being implemented, Izenson said, adding that they expect the policy will shake out differently for different people depending on what airline passengers choose, and other elements of their identity.

“That question depends on a person’s experience and identity and how they move through the world on a number of levels, including what gender they are perceived as, what their body looks like, what their skin tone is, how they’re dressed,” Izenson said.

Izenson thinks that the intention of the policy has little to do with passports and airports, saying: “They are trying to throw us into a state of reactivity so that we’re not able to focus on practical advocacy and the material needs of our communities. The more they can keep us confused and freaked out and not sure what’s going on, the more they can do whatever they want.”