GETTING WITH THE TIMES

U.S. Issues First Passport With ‘X’ Gender Marker

The State Department expects the option to be more widely available next year.

The U.S. has finally made one of its most widely held documents gender-neutral: the passport. The State Department said Wednesday it had issued its first passport with an “X” designation for gender, coming four months after the change was announced and years after the issue was first raised legally. Jessica Stern, the U.S.’s special diplomatic envoy for LGBTQ rights, told the Associated Press that the change reflects the “lived reality” shared by transgender, intersex, and non-binary individuals, among other groups. “When a person obtains identity documents that reflect their true identity, they live with greater dignity and respect,” Stern said. The department plans to make the option more widely available next year and hopes the move will spur other countries to offer the same option. “We see this as a way of affirming and uplifting the human rights of trans and intersex and gender-nonconforming and nonbinary people everywhere,” Stern said.