Oregon Was First
In 2017, Oregon became the first state to allow a nonbinary “X” gender marker on driver’s licenses. California followed in 2018. By 2025, 22 states and DC offer the option. 16 states and DC allow X markers on birth certificates. Colorado issued the first intersex birth certificate in 2018.
22 states + DC allow X markers on driver’s licenses. 6 states rolled it back. The federal government banned it on passports.
For millions of nonbinary Americans, these documents were the first time the government acknowledged what they already knew about themselves.
6 States Took It Back
Arkansas, Florida, Idaho, Kansas, Tennessee, and Texas now prohibit X markers on driver’s licenses. Idaho, Iowa, Montana, and Oklahoma prohibit them on birth certificates. Oklahoma was the first state to explicitly ban nonbinary birth certificates, in April 2022.
Kansas went further. In 2026, the state sent letters to trans residents telling them their existing driver’s licenses were invalid. Not that the policy had changed going forward. That the document in their wallet, the one they had been using to drive, to vote, to board planes, to prove who they are, was no longer recognized by the state that issued it.
The Federal Ban
On January 20, 2025, President Trump signed an executive order banning X gender markers on U.S. passports. The State Department stopped processing applications for updated or nonbinary gender markers. On November 6, 2025, the Supreme Court stayed a lower court’s injunction, allowing the ban to remain in effect. Only M or F, matching sex at birth.
A federal judge temporarily blocked the policy in June 2025. The State Department continued processing passports while the case proceeds. But as of late 2025, the policy stands.
Passports already issued with X markers remain valid until they expire. But Customs and Border Protection guidance from October 2025 says its systems no longer accept gender markers other than M or F for international travel. Travelers with X passports may be required to choose M or F when booking plane tickets.
Domestic travel is not affected. State-issued documents are not affected by the federal policy. The 22 states that offer X markers on licenses continue to do so.
Two Maps
The country has split into two maps. On one, 22 states and DC say nonbinary people exist on paper. On the other, the federal government and 6 states say they do not.
A nonbinary person in Oregon can get an X on their license, their birth certificate, and their state ID. They cannot get one on their passport. A nonbinary person in Kansas had an X on their license until the state sent them a letter saying it was no longer valid.
This is not about bureaucracy. A government document is how you prove who you are at a traffic stop, at a TSA checkpoint, at an emergency room, at a polling place. When the state removes your ability to identify yourself accurately, it is not administrative. It is a statement about whether you count.
32 States Still Have Marriage Bans on the Books
This is part of a pattern. 32 states still have constitutional or statutory bans on same-sex marriage that remain on the books — unenforceable under Obergefell, but never repealed. Only 18 states and DC have fully removed theirs. California, Colorado, and Hawaii voted to repeal their bans in November 2024.
Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in his Dobbs concurrence that the Court “should reconsider all of this Court’s substantive due process precedents, including Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell.” At Catholic University in 2025, he said that if a decision is “totally stupid, you don’t go along with it just because it’s decided.”
If Obergefell falls, 31 states would immediately ban same-sex marriage.
The X on a driver’s license and the marriage certificate in a county clerk’s office are both government acknowledgments that a person exists as they are. Both can be revoked.
Read more on the LGBTQ Rights hub.