Hundreds of federal surveys have removed sexual orientation and gender identity questions since Donald Trump returned to office in January, a new report from the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law finds.

Measures of gender identity accounted for the vast majority of removals, the report shows. Approximately 360 federal data collections have removed at least one sexual orientation or gender identity question.

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The majority of the removals were based on Trump’s so-called “gender ideology” executive order, issued on his first day back in office.

“Data on sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) are essential for understanding the characteristics of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) populations in the United States,” the authors write.

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“However, on the first day of his second term, President Donald Trump issued an executive order that declared it was official policy of the administration that transgender, nonbinary, and intersex identities would not be recognized by the federal government. In response, federal agencies began removing gender identity questions, along with several other data elements related to LGBT communities, from a broad range of federal data collections.”

Report researchers found that the vast majority of those changes (83%) bypassed normal channels for alterations to federal surveys and questionnaires, or the formal notice-and-comment process. Instead, nearly all the changes were instituted through “non-substantive change requests” made to the Office of Management and Budget.

That department is run by Russell Vought, a longtime Heritage Foundation collaborator who has been instrumental in enacting Project 2025 in Trump’s second term.

Project 2025 calls for removing the terms “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” from “every federal rule, agency regulation, contract, grant, regulation, and piece of legislation that exists.” 

The Williams Institute report found the SOGI removals span multiple data collection types, including national surveys and surveillance systems, government-funded research studies, programmatic monitoring systems and evaluation studies, and administrative forms and records.

The majority (94%) of data elements removed from federal collections were gender identity demographic measures, but more than 60 data collections also removed sexual orientation data elements that didn’t fall under that executive order or other related implementation guidance.

Twenty-three collections removed sexual orientation and/or gender identity data elements from questionnaires addressing bias motivation, like crime surveys, precluding the ability of law enforcement and other agencies to determine or report discrimination on those bases.

All of these changes, individually and collectively, are undermining the effective implementation of federal government policy, say the authors, who quote the Office of Management and Budget itself under previous leadership: “Federal information is both a strategic asset and a valuable national resource. It enables the Government to carry out its mission and programs effectively.”

Implementation of Project 2025’s Christian nationalist agenda, however, is undermining that mission.

“Federal SOGI data has informed policymakers, researchers, and service providers, enabling them to identify disparities, allocate resources equitably, and design programs that meet the needs of LGBT people,” the authors write.

“Much of this work is now being reversed under President Trump’s executive orders.”

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