Persecution of transgender people under the second Trump administration

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The persecution of transgender people under the second Donald Trump administration refers to government measures beginning in January 2025 that removed federal recognition of transgender people, eliminated or restricted many of their legal rights in the United States, and were accompanied by dehumanizing and eliminationist rhetoric seeking to eradicate transgender identities from public life.

The Trump administration's actions targeting transgender people form part of the broader 2020s anti-LGBTQ movement in the United States and the anti-gender movement. Commentators and scholars have compared these actions to the early stages of persecution of queer people in Nazi Germany,^[1] citing the removal of legal rights, the erasure of research and trans education materials,^[2] censorship of language, dehumanization, purges of transgender government employees,^[3] restrictions on passports and international travel,^[4] promotion of transgender health care misinformation and attempts to intimidate or deter providers of gender-affirming care, and portrayal of transgender people as a social threat. Collectively, such efforts to erase transgender people through laws, rhetoric, and denial of health care are increasingly referred to as transgender genocide in contemporary human rights, activist, and some scholarly discourse.

Following Donald Trump’s inauguration of his second presidency on January 20, 2025 he began issuing a series of executive orders targeting transgender people across the United States.^[5]

On the January 20, 2025, shortly after being inaugurated, President Donald Trump signed an Executive Order,^[6][7] which defined sex in the eyes of the federal government as a male-female binary, with "female" and "male" defined as "a person belonging, at conception to the sex that produces the large reproductive cell" and a "person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the small reproductive cell", respectively.^[6] The order also mandated that:

• Federal agencies should use "sex" instead of "gender", remove materials that "promote gender ideology", and halt "funding of gender ideology"^{[6]: § 3(a), 3(e)}
• Official government documents such as passports and visas stop allowing self-selection of gender^{[6]: § 3(d)}
• Transgender people be barred from government-funded single-sex facilities congruent with their gender identity^{[6]: § 4}
• The Bureau of Prisons halt any federal funding for gender-affirming care.^{[6]: § 4(c)}
• That federal funding no longer go to gender-affirming care^[8]
• The attorney general provide guidance "to correct the misapplication of the Supreme Court's decision in Bostock v. Clayton County (2020) to sex-based distinctions" in federal agency activities.^{[6]: § 3(f)}
• Prior policies and federal government documents that are inconsistent with this order be rescinded, including policies that require the use of names and pronouns consistent with a person's gender identity in federal workplaces.

Provisions of the order have faced legal challenges, with temporary restraining orders having been issued to suspend the withholding of federal funding to programs that fund gender-affirming care and promote "gender ideology", the forced transfers of transgender inmates to facilities congruent with their sex assigned at birth, and the mass removal of documents published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Food and Drug Administration, Department of Health and Human Services that mention topics related to "gender ideology".^[9][10][11]

In July 2025, The Lancet published an investigation which alleged that around half of all US health datasets were secretly and substantially altered in the two months after the executive order was signed, with the alterations being done to remove messages that "promote or otherwise inculcate gender ideology".^[12][13]

On January 27, 2025, Trump signed an executive order declaring that a soldier being trans “conflicts with a soldier's commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in one's personal life” and that trans people “cannot satisfy the rigorous standards necessary for military service”.^[14]

On March 18, 2025, Judge Ana C. Reyes blocked the executive order, ruling that banning trans people from the military likely violated their constitutional rights.^[15]

A May 15 memo later detailed how trans service members would be discharged, saying that they would be given the discharge code of “JDK”, which is typically used to indicate that a soldier is considered a threat to national security, and which can prevent them from getting future jobs or security clearances.^[16] An August 4 United States Air Force memo announced that long-serving transgender members normally eligible for retirement benefits would be denied them.^[17]

On January 28, 2025, Trump signed an executive order to "Protect Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation". The order described gender-affirming care for minors as "chemical and surgical mutilation of children" as well as "maiming" and "sterilizing".^[18] It stated "countless children" who received such care would regret a "horrifying tragedy that they will never be able to conceive children of their own or nurture their children through breastfeeding."^[19] The order also described the World Professional Association for Transgender Health's (WPATH) guidance as "junk science".^[19][18]

The order states that the US Federal Government will not "fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support the so-called 'transition' of a child from one sex to another."^[20] The provisions include:

• Directing the United States Department of Health and Human Services to review the terms of insurance under Medicare, Medicaid, and the Affordable Care Act to end certain gender affirming care;^[20]
• Told federal agencies providing federal grants to medical institutions to make sure those institutions were not carrying out any gender-related procedures;^[20]
• Protects whistleblowers who report on institutions that provide gender affirming care in violation of the executive order.^[21]

In response, some hospitals paused providing gender-affirming care for minors, while others continued. Attorneys general from 15 states said their states are committed to continuing to provide gender-affirming care to minors. Multiple groups filed lawsuits challenging the legality of the executive order. In response to one of the lawsuits, several federal judges issued injunctions blocking the government from withholding federal funds from hospitals that provide gender affirming care to minors.^[22][11] Following the injunction, some hospitals that initially paused gender-affirming care for minors resumed the care.^[23][24]

On January 29, 2025, Trump signed an executive order "Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling".^[25]

On February 5, 2025, Trump signed an executive order titled "Keeping Men Out of Women's Sports", which directs federal agencies and state attorneys general to immediately enforce a prohibition of transgender girls and women from participating in women's sports.^[26][27] The order does not ban transgender men athletes from playing on male sports teams.^[28] As part of this order's implementation, the Department of Education urged high school and college athletics organizations NCAA and NFHS to revoke female transgender athletes' records and restore cisgender athletes' ones.^[28] The State Department also announced a ban on transgender athletes from entering the United States if they attempt to compete in women's sports, and that visa applicants suspected of such would have their file marked with the letters 'SWS25' for the purposes of tracking. Visa applicants for any purpose who list a gender other than their assigned sex on their visa application will be permanently banned from entering the United States on grounds of “fraud”.^[29]

At the United Nations, the United States under Trump routinely uses their influence action against transgender rights globally, even when unrelated to the topic of discussion. For example, in a June 2025 meeting on chemical pollution, the American delegate made a point of repeatedly disputing any gender-related language that did not explicitly “recognize women are biologically female and men are biologically male”; while in another case, the United States disapproved of a declaration supporting the rights of women and girls because it included no language to exclude trans women from its purview. Both advocates and the Trump Administration have suggested that the United States might use compliance at the UN as a metric for determining which countries receive foreign aid.^[30]

On January 28, 2025, Trump ordered a freeze on all federal funding grants, loans, and aid while those receiving them were assessed to make sure they were not promoting "advance Marxist equity, transgenderism, and green new deal social engineering policies".^[31]

On September 4, 2025, multiple news organizations reported that the Department of Justice under Secretary Pam Bondi was looking into ways to limit transgender individuals' right to keep and bear arms.^[32][33]

In August 2025, Texas state legislation introduced Senate Bill 8 (SB8), a so-called “bathroom bill” that would restrict transgender people’s access to public bathrooms of their gender. Under the bill facilities could be fined up to $125,000 per offense, as well as authorizing private citizens reports.^[34]

Also in August 2025, Alaskan republican Matt Heilala introduced a draft to the Alaska State Medical Board that would discipline any medical providers in the states that are providing gender-affirming care for youth. The board unanimously approved the proposal on August 22, 2025 without public input on the proposal. Heilala announced his immediate resignation following the conclusion of the meeting, and announced his plan to run for Governor of Alaska at the next election. In response, Tom Pittman, executive director of Anchorage-based advocacy and health care organization Identity Inc said that “nearly 700 Alaska medical professionals have signed an open letter opposing the changes being considered by the board.”^[35]

Scholars and extremism experts have warned that the Trump administration’s sustained targeting of transgender people — a group comprising less than 1% of the U.S. population — resembles authoritarian strategies that single out a vulnerable minority in order to consolidate power. Analysts have pointed to historical parallels, such as the Nazi destruction of the Institute for Sexual Research in 1933, where attacks on a visible queer institution were used to galvanize support for broader repression.^[36]

Civil rights groups also argue that the Trump administration's language opens the door to wider censorship and repression, noting that book bans and curriculum restrictions have increasingly targeted works on gender, sexuality, and racial justice under the banner of fighting "gender ideology."^[37]

Within this climate, Trump has repeatedly characterized transgender identities as a societal menace. He has called transgender people "lunacy" or "insanity," insisted in speeches that "there are only two genders, male and female," and ridiculed transgender athletes at campaign rallies to cheers from his supporters.^[38]

Fact-checks of his 2025 State of the Union address noted that Trump falsely claimed taxpayer dollars were spent on "making mice transgender," mischaracterizing NIH-funded medical research into hormone therapy and HIV treatment.^[39]

NPR and other outlets have documented a broader pattern in which Trump and allied Republicans seize on mass shootings and other tragedies to falsely identify perpetrators as transgender, part of a political strategy to scapegoat a small minority group. Experts on extremism and disinformation have warned that such rhetoric deliberately fosters fear and division, echoing earlier authoritarian tactics to rally support by vilifying minorities.^[40] The New York Times has noted that Trump’s directives and speeches regularly use terms such as "maiming" or "junk science" to try to portray trans people as lacking honesty and integrity.^[41]

The Trump administration’s actions targeting transgender people have led some transgender Americans to seek refuge abroad. Advocacy organizations and media outlets reported an increase in transgender people leaving the United States or making plans to do so in response to the rollback of rights, workplace exclusions, and the Trump administration’s rhetoric portraying transgender identities as a social threat.

In March 2025, YES! Magazine documented cases of transgender asylum seekers in Mexico who cited fear of persecution under Trump's executive orders and anti-trans policies. These asylum seekers said that relocating was a matter of personal safety.^[42]

Canadian media reported U.S. transgender families preparing "go bags" and considering asylum after Trump's re-election, citing fears over bathroom bills, the loss of gender-affirming care, and restrictions on passports.^[43][44] Immigration attorneys in Canada reported a surge of inquiries from transgender and non-binary Americans seeking to relocate or claim asylum after Trump’s January 2025 executive orders. Lawyers cited widespread fears over loss of gender-affirming care, restrictions on passports, and safety concerns, and noted that several test cases could establish precedent for U.S. trans nationals claiming refugee protection in Canada.^[45][46][47]

In April 2025, the Norwegian Green Party proposed granting asylum to transgender Americans on the grounds that they were being persecuted, comparing their situation to marginalized groups in 1930s Germany. The proposal drew attention in European media and was framed as part of a broader debate about democratic backsliding and human rights in the United States.^[48] In August 2025, a 28-year-old transgender woman from California, Veronica Clifford-Carlos, challenged the Dutch government's rejection of her asylum claim. Her case, supported by the Dutch NGO LGBT Asylum Support, was described as the first of its kind in the Netherlands, which reported a rise in U.S. citizens applying for asylum since Trump's return to office.^[49]

Scholars, human rights organizations, and commentators have debated whether actions under the second Trump administration targeting transgender people amount to genocide, while its description as a form of discrimination and persecution is less controversial.

A number of advocacy and genocide-prevention groups have warned that the cumulative effect of federal and state measures targeting transgender people exhibits genocidal dynamics or “red flags,” particularly when coupled with eliminationist rhetoric in public life. These analyses point to policies and statements seeking to remove legal recognition of transgender identity, restrict access to health care, and exclude transgender people from public institutions, and argue that such measures can inflict serious bodily or mental harm on an identifiable group.^[50] Commentary has also highlighted public calls to “eradicate transgenderism from public life,” which critics characterize as eliminationist or genocidal rhetoric, even where speakers distinguish between “transgenderism” and transgender people.

Many legal scholars argue that the Genocide Convention's protected-group limitation and the requirement of intent to physically or biologically destroy a protected group are not satisfied by policies that target transgender people as such, even if the measures cause serious harm. Recent legal scholarship assessing anti-trans legislation in the United States concludes that these actions likely do not meet the legal definition of genocide, while emphasizing the severity of harms imposed.^[51]

Commentators and scholars have drawn parallels between the Trump administration's targeting of transgender people and the persecution of homosexuals and gender-nonconforming people in Nazi Germany. The erasure of research, censorship of language, and targeting of transgender people as a social threat have been repeatedly cited as bearing striking resemblance to the early stages of queer persecution in 1930s Germany.^[1]

In 1933, Nazi students destroyed the Institute for Sexual Research in Berlin, founded by Jewish sexologist Magnus Hirschfeld, which had pioneered studies of gender identity and medical transition. Its library of research on transgender and queer lives was burned, an act widely seen as the beginning of the Nazi regime's systematic erasure of queer culture and knowledge. LGBTQ people were later targeted under the Nazi regime through imprisonment, medical experimentation, and, in the case of homosexual men, internment marked by the pink triangle symbol. Several observers have compared this destruction of knowledge with the Trump administration's removal of federal webpages and health datasets referencing transgender populations in early 2025, following executive orders banning “gender ideology.” Entire sections of research on HIV, contraceptive use, health equity, and workplace discrimination disappeared from government sites. Critics have described these actions as a form of internet-age book burning.^[1]

Parallels have also been drawn between Nazi use of broad ideological categories such as “un-German” and the Trump administration's emphasis on opposing “DEI” or “gender ideology.” According to scholars, both function as umbrella terms that designate targeted groups as enemies of the nation and justify their exclusion from public life.^[1]

• 2020s anti-LGBTQ movement in the United States
• Persecution of homosexuals in Nazi Germany
• Transgender people in Nazi Germany
• Donald Trump and fascism