
The Trump administration on Wednesday ordered a shutdown of all federal programs that “promote or reflect gender ideology,” the latest action in service of the president’s pledge to root out “woke” ideology from the federal government and erase transgender identity from American society.
Included as an example of woke ideology was allowing trans people to use the facilities that correspond to their genders, effectively banning trans people from using the bathroom on federal property
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The directive follows and builds on Trump’s Day One executive order to make it “the policy of the United States to recognize two sexes, male and female” and “take all necessary steps, as permitted by law, to end the Federal funding of gender ideology.”
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A memo from the federal Office of Personnel Management instructs government agencies to ensure bathrooms are designated only for “women, girls, or females (or for men, boys, or males),” cancel trainings that promote “gender ideology,” disband associated employee resource groups, remove all outward-facing media that “inculcate or promote gender ideology,” and disable email features that prompt users for pronouns.
The directive mandates a review of all agency forms and communications that require employees to identify their gender to ensure that only “male” or “female” can be chosen, and to replace any references to “gender” with “sex.”
All agency heads have until Friday at 5:00 p.m. to inform staff associated with “gender ideology” programs they’ll be placed on administrative leave, effective immediately.
The memo is the latest in a series of declarations fulfilling Trump’s campaign promise to eradicate so-called “gender ideology,” which Trump and his MAGA allies describe as a “cancer” on American society. Transgender Americans are at the center the purge.
Since taking office, Trump has sought to bar trans-inclusive policies in local schools, halted transgender people’s passport applications, ordered transgender women inmates in federal custody into men’s facilities, issued an executive order to stop transition-related healthcare for anyone under 19 years old, and declared his intention to rid the military of trans service members.
The memo instructed agencies to ensure that “intimate spaces” are “designated by biological sex and not gender identity,” formally barring transgender employees from using bathrooms, locker rooms, and other spaces in accordance with their gender identity, effective Friday.
Just released memorandum from OPM: Federal facilities will now have a bathroom ban for transgender people. It will go into effect on the 31st. It also has a slew of effects and puts into place the 1st anti-trans EO policies for every agency. This will have a ton of impacts very quickly.
— Erin Reed (@erininthemorning.com) January 29, 2025 at 6:21 PM
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Trump’s Day One, two-sexes order defines “gender ideology” as “the biological category of sex with an ever-shifting concept of self-assessed gender identity, permitting the false claim that males can identify as and thus become women and vice versa, and requiring all institutions of society to regard this false claim as true.”
Last week, the Office of Personnel Management was responsible for similar guidance shutting down diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives across the federal government. Those programs sought to reduce systemic barriers for women and Black, Hispanic, Asian, Native American and disabled Americans.
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