An nameless recreation developer going by the identify “Sawyer Soe” has joined the ranks of these submitting a lawsuit in opposition to President Donald Trump’s administration, accusing it of discriminatory conduct for a brand new anti-trans passport coverage issued on January 20, 2025.
The lawsuit—filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts on February 7—argues that President Trump, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and the State Division made a “abrupt, discriminatory, and harmful reversal” of current passport coverage. Through the Biden administration, transgender, nonbinary, and intersex Individuals have been capable of receive passports that precisely mirrored their gender id.
Beneath Trump, the Division ceased issuing passports for the “X” marker utilized by many nonbinary Individuals, and can now not enable people to alter the gender on their passport after transitioning, requiring them to depend on paperwork that determine them by their intercourse assigned at beginning.
Soe’s participation within the lawsuit spells out in plain phrases how this alteration in coverage places transgender, nonbinary, and intersex recreation builders in danger.
“The Passport Coverage is illegal and unconstitutional,” the ACLU mentioned in its submitting. “It discriminates in opposition to people primarily based on their intercourse and, as to some, their transgender standing. It’s motivated by impermissible animus. It can’t be justified underneath any degree of judicial scrutiny, and it wrongly seeks to erase the fact that transgender, intersex, and nonbinary individuals exist at this time as they all the time have.”
Soe is one in all seven plaintiffs represented by the ACLU on this case. They and plaintiff “Bella Boe” have filed for anonymity throughout the lawsuit’s proceedings. The go well with argues that Soe, a nonbinary developer working for “an organization that may be a chief in online game growth,” is amongst these harmed by the passport rule change.
How? The go well with states that Soe has not been capable of precisely replace their United States passport, which expired in 2019, shortly once they got here out publicly as nonbinary. Soe’s employer is seemingly planning an “on-site collaboration” with their colleagues in Canada, and they are going to be “required” by their employer to journey internationally to Canada a number of occasions within the coming yr.
“[Soe] would really feel safer if that they had an ‘X’ intercourse designation on their passport as a result of it will be in line with their id, it will shield their privateness as it will forestall disclosure of their intercourse assigned at beginning to strangers, and it will match the opposite id paperwork that they at the moment carry,” the submitting continues. “Because of the Passport Coverage, [Soe] will now not be capable of receive an ‘X’ intercourse designation on their passport that precisely displays who they’re, how they specific their id, and the way others understand them.”
Sawyer Soe’s wrestle spotlights the dangers of hurt to transgender recreation builders underneath Trump
In 2024, recreation builders publicly anxious on a number of events {that a} return to workplace by President Trump might result in hurt to their skilled group. Among the many many considerations have been these pushed by “Venture 2025,” a Heritage Basis-led initiative to set coverage and pre-screen staffers for the brand new administration. The group recorded its objectives in a widely-viewed doc referred to as “The Mandate for Management.”
The doc doesn’t make any statements on coverage modifications surrounding gender id markers on passports. However as we famous final yr, the doc takes purpose at transgender Individuals, figuring out “transgender ideology” as a type of pornography that has “no First Modification safety.”
Former President-Elect Trump Transition Crew chief counsel additionally argued within the doc that the Division of Labor ought to “rescind rules prohibiting discrimination on the premise of sexual orientation, gender id, transgender standing, and intercourse traits.”
Soe’s participation within the ACLU-filed go well with spells out one other occasion of how Trump-led anti-trans insurance policies would possibly affect many recreation builders. As massive studios and publishers stretch their operations across the globe, staff are being requested to journey internationally to work on or generally promote their video games.
At this second, transgender, nonbinary, and intersex staff needing to replace their passports can solely interact in mentioned journey in the event that they settle for—because the ACLU describes—”phrases that expose them to grievous harms and violate their constitutional rights to equal safety, journey, privateness, and speech.”
