President Trump has been handed another victory at the Supreme Court, where the justices on Thursday ruled that he could limit gender ideology statements on American passports.
Lower courts, responding to lawsuits by leftist activists, had claimed that they had the authority to order Trump to issue passports that claimed special sex designations for nonbinary and transgender people.
The Supreme Court halted those orders that would have allowed passport holders to creatively dictate whatever gender ideology they adopted for their passports.
“Displaying passport holders’ sex at birth,” the majority said, “no more offends equal protection principles than displaying their country of birth—in both cases, the Government is merely attesting to a historical fact without subjecting anyone to differential treatment.”
A report posted at Scotusblog noted that Ketanji Jackson, a far-left member of the court, was joined by Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan in claiming the ruling actually “paved the way for the immediate infliction of injury without adequate (or, really, any) justification. Because I cannot acquiesce to this pointless but painful perversion of our equitable discretion, I respectfully dissent.”
The lower court order had come from Julia Kobick, a judge who heard the complaints from transgender plaintiffs and insisted the White House follow her orders.
Trump’s executive order simply had said the federal government would only “recognize two sexes, male and female.”
That was followed by instructions to the State Department that government documents reflect the holder’s sex, not sex ideology.
Joe Biden, while in office, had promoted such alternative sex beliefs in multiple forums.
The activists claimed Trump’s order violated their equal protection rights, their rights to travel and more.
The 1st Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals had sided with the progressive ideology, but U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer told the Supreme Court that Kobick was injuring the United States “by compelling it to speak to foreign governments in contravention of both the President’s foreign policy and scientific reality.’
Following the science, transgenderism is a fantasy, as being male or female is embedded in the body down to the DNA level.
Now the justices have granted the government’s request to pause Kobick’s demands.
The ruling pointed out Trump like will “succeed on the merits” of the arguments.
Jackson complained that now the plaintiffs won’t be able to get passports “with sex markers that match their gender identity” and that could lead to “psychological issues.”