President-elect Donald Trump doubled down on anti-trans rhetoric during a lengthy speech on Sunday, declaring that “it will be the official policy of the United States government that there are only two genders, male and female.”
AmericaFest is an annual event held by Turning Point USA, an organization for students in right-wing activism. Trump spoke at this year’s event in Phoenix, Arizona over the weekend, repeatedly lashing out at trans people while outlining his vision for his impending second term. As he put it to the crowd, “we are going to end the transgender lunacy.”
Trump pledged to sign a series of executive orders targeting the trans community on the first day of his presidency. The President-elect launched into his “two genders” tangent after telling the AmericaFest crowd that he would sign an executive order to “keep men out of women’s sports.” This gender binary rhetoric echoes Trump’s 2023 pledge to implement a proposed bill that would make “male” and “female,” as assigned at birth, the only legally recognized sexes in an attempt to effectively erase trans identity at the federal level.
He indicated that another one of these executive orders would fulfill one of his campaign trail promises, banning gender-affirming care for minors at the federal level. Trump falsely described gender-affirming care for trans youth as “child sexual mutilation,” language commonly used by the anti-trans Right. Meanwhile, the President-elect said that he would also sign executive orders to “get transgender out of the military and out of our elementary schools and middle schools and high schools.”
Trump has vowed to end gender-affirming care for trans youth, ban trans kids from playing sports, and erase trans people from public life. Can he really do it?
Trump is in fact planning an executive order that would lead to the removal of all trans members of the U.S. military. According to the outlet, there are about 15,000 active service personnel in the military who are trans. Under this order, they would be deemed “unfit to serve” and, according to sources who spoke to London-based outlet The Times, would be medically discharged from service.
Although it’s not totally clear how exactly Trump plans to “get transgender out” of schools, his previous comments about queer and trans rights in education offer some hints. When TIME magazine recently asked him whether he would repeal President Joe Biden’s trans-inclusive changes to Title IX, which he previously committed to doing, Trump replied that he would “look at it very closely.” These comments could also be a reference to Trump’s 2024 campaign platform, which included federal “Don’t Say Gay” policies limiting LGBTQ+ discussions in schools.
