President Donald Trump, in his inaugural week, has taken decisive executive action to uphold his campaign pledge of challenging the "gender ideology" prevalent in American institutions and advocating for "biological truth" grounded in "fundamental and incontrovertible reality.
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This move could potentially stir up further controversy in the Supreme Court, which is already set to rule on two significant gender-related cases this year.
According to Fox News, the Supreme Court recently agreed to hear the case of Mahmoud v. Taylor. This case will determine whether schools can compel teachers to read LGBTQ-themed books to elementary-age children, even if parents object. The crux of the matter is whether parents will retain the right to exempt their children from such instruction.
Sarah Marshall Perry, a senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation, in an interview with Fox News Digital, stated, "If the Supreme Court's doing its job, it shouldn't impact [the case decisions] at all." She further explained that Trump's executive order is essentially a declaration of the policies that the executive branch will follow in the new administration. Perry drew a comparison to former President Joe Biden's executive order, which expanded the definition of sex to include gender identity.
Perry emphasized the separation of powers between the executive and judiciary branches, noting that while the executive is primarily a political entity, the judiciary is non-political. She asserted that the Supreme Court must focus solely on the facts of the cases before them. These facts, she said, "will include questions relative to the parameters of the parental rights guidance on school curriculums and exactly what constitutes curriculum for purposes of opt-out, whether gender medicine and age and medical-based restrictions that happen to impact individuals who are transgender is a violation of the Equal Protection Clause."
In another case, Skrmetti v. U.S., the Supreme Court is considering whether the equal protection clause, which guarantees equal treatment under the law for individuals in similar circumstances, prohibits states from banning medical providers from offering puberty blockers and hormone treatments to children seeking transgender surgical procedures. The Biden administration joined the lawsuit by filing a petition to the Supreme Court in November 2023.
Perry expressed her belief that the American people are relieved to have a president who acknowledges biological reality and the rule of law. She said, "I think this election really sort of rises to shift, not just politically, but for many people philosophically as well, because we recognize that America was sort of pulled back from the perilous brink on even understanding what it meant to be male and female, even understanding what it meant to live amicably in a pluralistic society."
On Inauguration Day, Trump signed an executive order titled, "Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government." This order asserts that the U.S. will recognize only two sexes male and female based on immutable biological characteristics. It mandates that federal agencies, including those overseeing housing, prisons, and education, adhere to this definition when enforcing laws and issuing regulations. The order also directs changes to government-issued identification documents, bans the promotion of "gender ideology" in federal programs, and rescinds previous executive actions that promoted gender identity inclusion.
This executive order effectively reverses the Biden administration's executive order titled "Preventing and Combating Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity or Sexual Orientation," signed in 2021. Biden's order had directed federal agencies to interpret and enforce civil rights laws to prohibit discrimination based on gender identity and sexual orientation. Trump's new policy, however, instructs federal agencies to eliminate guidance or regulations that conflict with this biological truth-based approach.
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