Overview
- Justices lifted a lower-court injunction, allowing the State Department to require passport sex markers match sex assigned at birth and to remove the nonbinary “X” option.
- The order splits 6–3 along ideological lines, with Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson issuing a forceful dissent joined by the court’s two other liberals.
- The decision pauses a nationwide ruling by U.S. District Judge Julia Kobick in Massachusetts, after the First Circuit declined to grant the government a stay.
- Plaintiffs represented by the ACLU argue the policy violates equal-protection guarantees and increases risks of misidentification, harassment, or violence for transgender and nonbinary travelers.
- The unsigned order states that listing sex at birth records a historical fact rather than imposing differential treatment, emphasizing that the ruling addresses interim enforcement only.