Earlier this week, Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration quietly changed a policy that allowed Floridians to receive driver's licenses and state identification cards that reflect their gender identity.
The change comes after other state restrictions targeting transgender individuals, like a ban on Medicaid coverage for transgender people seeking hormone therapy and puberty blockers.
Simone Chriss, director of the transgender rights initiative at Southern Legal Counsel said many in the LGBTQ community are against the reversal.
“I think it's just another way of the state telling transgender Floridians we don't care about you, we don't respect who you are, and we don't want you here,” Chriss said. “This is the community that I work with, that I serve every day, and these folks have just been attacked from every angle.”
“People are horrified, people are truly afraid of what this means and afraid of what's going to happen next because the attacks just keep escalating."Simone Chriss
News Service of Florida reports a memo was sent out to county tax collectors saying that issuing drivers licenses and IDs that don’t reflect a person’s assigned gender at birth now conflicts with state law.
It was released last week by Robert Kynoch, deputy executive director of the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles.
It warned that “misrepresenting one’s gender, understood as sex, on a driver license constitutes fraud … and subjects an offender to criminal and civil penalties, including cancellation, suspension, or revocation of his or her driver license.”
Kynoch also wrote that “permitting an individual to alter his or her license to reflect an internal sense of gender role or identity, which is neither immutable nor objectively verifiable, undermines the purpose of an identification record and can frustrate the state’s ability to enforce its laws.”
Change made without public notice
The change was made with a lack of public notice and only gained traction after it was published by independent journalist Erin Reed.
On Monday evening, the post circulated on social media, and by Tuesday morning, criticism was flooding in.
“People are horrified,” Chriss said. “People are truly afraid of what this means and afraid of what's going to happen next because the attacks just keep escalating. That memo said that misrepresenting one's gender on a driver's license constitutes fraud and subjects offenders to criminal and civil penalties.”
Previously, the state agency adopted a policy in 2018 that allowed people to change their genetic marker using signed statements from physicians or court orders. In 2021, registered nurses were added to the list of those who could also sign off on the changes.
Chriss said that, with the reversal, people who have already amended their licenses are not at risk for civil or criminal penalties. It is when people go to renew their license that they would face a problem.
“Where the question comes in is, when they go and it's time to renew their license, how is the DMV going to interpret this policy? And will they reissue the license with the correct gender marker when a person's already amended it?” Chriss said.
“For folks who have already updated their U.S. passport or their birth certificate, that is a primary identification document. So under the language of their own policy, (they) should be issuing driver's licenses in accordance with the person's gender identity.”
Far-reaching ramifications
Chriss added that if trans people cannot get their reflected gender on documents, it could pose a safety risk.
“When a person has an identification document that doesn't reflect who they are, it can create a really dangerous situation. It can lead to unnecessary escalation with police, who may think that the person has a stolen ID or stolen car or is impersonating someone else,” Chriss said.
She also said that there are other ramifications when it comes to trying to get a job or receiving housing benefits if your gender does not reflect who you are.
Chriss is still trying to figure out what everything means and how the policy will be implemented — but she urges people to speak up.
“We need to make our voices heard, we need to show up, speak out,” Chriss said. “It’s a really untenable and really painful time for every trans person and every parent of a trans person or family member of a trans person in the state of Florida.”
