Executive Orders
October 7, 2025
By Laura Trachtman
I started this series because, at first glance, I was irritated and vexed at how nonsensical and idiotic this Executive Order was. Now that I’ve dug in and really spent time thinking about it, I’ve realized that this is an incredibly dangerous EO, as through its issuance, President Trump usurped the power of the Legislative and Judicial Branches, and has declared open war on Americans. Friends, if you aren’t worried, you should be.
In my previous posts about President Trump’s Executive Order, we discussed his blatant hypocrisy and pandering to bigots in determining that sex is a binary construct. We’re going to continue our examination of the third part of this policy, how it is perverting the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s mission, and how the Executive Branch has failed to respect the Judicial Branch’s authority to interpret laws and set precedent as well as the Legislative Branch’s authority to enact laws and dictate their purpose.
Section 3 states in pertinent part:
(d) The Secretaries of State and Homeland Security, and the Director of the Office of Personnel Management, shall implement changes to require that government-issued identification documents, including passports, visas, and Global Entry cards, accurately reflect the holder’s sex, as defined under section 2 of this order; and the Director of the Office of Personnel Management shall ensure that applicable personnel records accurately report Federal employees’ sex, as defined by section 2 of this order.
(e) Agencies shall remove all statements, policies, regulations, forms, communications, or other internal and external messages that promote or otherwise inculcate gender ideology, and shall cease issuing such statements, policies, regulations, forms, communications or other messages. Agency forms that require an individual’s sex shall list male or female, and shall not request gender identity. Agencies shall take all necessary steps, as permitted by law, to end the Federal funding of gender ideology.
(f) The prior Administration argued that the Supreme Court’s decision in Bostock v. Clayton County (2020), which addressed Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, requires gender identity-based access to single-sex spaces under, for example, Title IX of the Educational Amendments Act. This position is legally untenable and has harmed women. The Attorney General shall therefore immediately issue guidance to agencies to correct the misapplication of the Supreme Court’s decision in Bostock v. Clayton County (2020) to sex-based distinctions in agency activities. In addition, the Attorney General shall issue guidance and assist agencies in protecting sex-based distinctions, which are explicitly permitted under Constitutional and statutory precedent.
(g) Federal funds shall not be used to promote gender ideology. Each agency shall assess grant conditions and grantee preferences and ensure grant funds do not promote gender ideology.
While Section 3(d) isn’t the main thrust of today’s post, I cannot let it pass uncommented upon. What this does is it misgenders those individuals who have already corrected their gender identity. As a brief reminder, Section 2 forces individuals to identify with the gender they had “at conception”; as another brief reminder, this exposes this policy as written by idiots as everyone is female at conception (which is why everyone has nipples). The practical effect of this policy is that individuals who present and identify as female, although assigned the male gender at birth, will be forcibly reclassified as male, and those who present and identify as male, although assigned the female gender at birth, will be forcibly reclassified as female. In an ironic twist, this will force trans men to use female bathrooms – which, as we discussed in an earlier post on this topic, will force men into women’s bathrooms and into women’s domestic violence shelters, which are two issues that this Executive Order allegedly sought to correct. As I said, this was written by idiots.
However, Sections 3(e) and (g) this Executive Order are significantly more dangerous than I initially anticipated, as they serve to declare war on the trans community. This is eloquently and briefly described in the resignation email of Marc Byron Seawright, former Director of Information Governance and Strategy, which can be found here. In this email, Mr. Seawright noted that:
As a transgender and queer man, I have experienced direct and escalating harm in the form of open hostility toward LGBTQ+ people along with internal agency actions that undermine my credibility, diminish my role, and isolate me from decision-making. Until now, my accomplishments have been consistently praised and highly rated. Now, I am systematically devalued. I have been excluded from discussions where my expertise was once sought, and my professional recommendations have been disregarded without justification. I endure passive exclusion, professional isolation, and a hostile work environment because who I am does not align with the anti LGBTQ+ rhetoric of this interim [EEOC] administration.
This is wildly alarming. The EEOC, the executive agency specifically tasked with prosecuting discrimination, has itself become the catspaw of this transphobic Administration. This transformation of the EEOC defeats the purpose of the legislation that created it and fails to accord trans Americans their Constitutionally guaranteed rights to equal protection and thus takes power from Congress, which enacted this legislation.
But wait, there’s more. President Trump’s directive in Section 3(f) to ignore the decision issued by the Supreme Court of the United States in Bostock v. Clayton County (2020) is nothing less than a usurpation of the power of the Judicial Branch and an affront to our system of government. Critically, this also underscores the Trump Administration’s declaration of war on queer and trans individuals by allowing employers to fire individuals simply for being queer or trans, which SCOTUS in Bostock v. Clayton County determined was a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, and thus illegal. Now, per President Trump’s Executive Order, that’s actually totally fine.
So now, where does a trans person turn should they be discriminated against in employment? They have no protections under the EEOC, the federal agency tasked with preventing and remedying illegal discrimination. We can hope that our trans friend lives in a state (or city) which has enacted strict anti-discrimination laws and can turn to that entity for assistance, but with this Administration challenging the foundation blocks of our very government, I am left to wonder how long until the Trump Administration takes aim at the Tenth Amendment. So far, President Trump has issued this Executive Order which has disregarded the powers of the Judicial Branch and the Legislative Branch; how long until President Trump takes aim at the powers reserved to the States?
September 23, 2025
By Laura Trachtman
In my previous post about President Trump’s Executive Order, we discussed his blatant hypocrisy and pandering to bigots in determining that sex is a binary construct. We’re going to continue our examination of the second part of this policy, and how it is just plain wrong.
Now, in full disclosure, this is going to be a post addressing mostly science and history/sociology, but the idiocy of it all continues to vex me, so bear with me. Or, tune in soon for part three, where I return to the law.
The Executive Order reads:
Sec. 2. Policy and Definitions. It is the policy of the United States to recognize two sexes, male and female. These sexes are not changeable and are grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality. Under my direction, the Executive Branch will enforce all sex-protective laws to promote this reality, and the following definitions shall govern all Executive interpretation of and application of Federal law and administration policy:
(a) “Sex” shall refer to an individual’s immutable biological classification as either male or female. “Sex” is not a synonym for and does not include the concept of “gender identity.”
(b) “Women” or “woman” and “girls” or “girl” shall mean adult and juvenile human females, respectively.
(c) “Men” or “man” and “boys” or “boy” shall mean adult and juvenile human males, respectively.
(d) “Female” means a person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the large reproductive cell.
(e) “Male” means a person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the small reproductive cell.
(f) “Gender ideology” replaces 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. Gender ideology includes the idea that there is a vast spectrum of genders that are disconnected from one’s sex. Gender ideology is internally inconsistent, in that it diminishes sex as an identifiable or useful category but nevertheless maintains that it is possible for a person to be born in the wrong sexed body.
(g) “Gender identity” reflects a fully internal and subjective sense of self, disconnected from biological reality and sex and existing on an infinite continuum, that does not provide a meaningful basis for identification and cannot be recognized as a replacement for sex.
You’ll note that I have highlighted Sections 2d and 2e above. Why? Because even as an indifferent science student, I remember that at conception, every single fetus is female. This is why men have nipples, because fetuses develop nipples before the biological sex is determined by chromosomes.
Knowing that simply because I say something doesn’t make it true, this book, Understanding the Biology of Sex and Gender Differences; Wizemann TM, Pardue ML, editors. Washington (DC): National Academies Press (US); 2001, confirms my recollection (emphasis supplied):
All human individuals—whether they have an XX, an XY, or an atypical sex chromosome combination—begin development from the same starting point. During early development the gonads of the fetus remain undifferentiated; that is, all fetal genitalia are the same and are phenotypically female. After approximately 6 to 7 weeks of gestation, however, the expression of a gene on the Y chromosome induces changes that result in the development of the testes. Thus, this gene is singularly important in inducing testis development. The production of testosterone at about 9 weeks of gestation results in the development of the reproductive tract and the masculinization (the normal development of male sex characteristics) of the brain and genitalia. In contrast to the role of the fetal testis in differentiation of a male genital tract and external genitalia in utero, fetal ovarian secretions are not required for female sex differentiation. As these details point out, the basic differences between the sexes begin in the womb, and this chapter examines how sex differences develop and change across the lifetime. The committee examined both normal and abnormal routes of development that lead individuals to become males and females and the changes during childhood, reproductive adulthood, and the later stages of life.
Obviously, this disproves President Trump’s assertion that gender is immutable, as all festus are female at conception, and only later do they transform into males (or others!).
President Trump also asserted in Section 2a that gender is a binary. Please note that aside from confirming that all humans are female at conception, this article also acknowledges that there exist atypical sex chromosome combinations, thus defying the assertion that gender is a binary.
We’re going to move on to gender ideology and gender identity. Not only are there myriad examples of trans people in today’s society, there have been trans individuals since society began. Before you scoff at the ignorant pre-historical people and say that they don’t count, Generals Casimir Pulaski (1745-1779), who saved George Washington’s life at the Battle of Brandywine in 1777 and who died fighting for the Revolution, and James Barry (1789-1865), who served across the British Empire and fought to improve living conditions for the soldiers who served under him, were both trans men. Many Americans know about two-spirit American Indians, and Zapotecan muxes, but there are also other people as well across the globe. To insist that, because our American culture does not celebrate a third gender, there is no third gender, is just ignorant.
If you take away nothing else from this post, please read this: it’s no one’s business, especially our government, what’s in anyone else’s pants. If you are a believer in any of the Abrahamic religions, please review Genesis 1:27. If you find yourself wondering whether someone you interact with is male or female or trans or something else, you can politely ask them what their pronouns are, or you can remind yourself that it is truly none of your business.
August 12, 2025
By Laura Trachtman
In January 2025, the President Trump Administration issued an Executive Order claiming that gender is binary, and a person is either a man or a woman. Let’s take a brief step into this document and review the reasoning behind the same.
President Trump claimed that “[a]cross the country, ideologues who deny the biological reality of sex have increasingly used legal and other socially coercive means to permit men to self-identify as women and gain access to intimate single-sex spaces and activities designed for women, from women’s domestic abuse shelters to women’s workplace showers. This is wrong. Efforts to eradicate the biological reality of sex fundamentally attack women by depriving them of their dignity, safety, and well-being. The erasure of sex in language and policy has a corrosive impact not just on women but on the validity of the entire American system. Basing Federal policy on truth is critical to scientific inquiry, public safety, morale, and trust in government itself.” There’s a lot to unpack here.
First, this Executive Order references single-sex domestic abuse shelters as places of refuge for women, but that’s it. Despite the acknowledgement, however brief, that women are the demographic group to suffer by far the most from domestic abuse, no plans have been iterated to support relief in this area. In other words, the President has said that this is an area that women in particular need assistance with, but no plans have been made to help women in this area. On the contrary, the recent federal budget cuts have reduced federal spending in this area by a third. So here we have an Executive Order that specifically referenced a need unique to female Americans, and not half a year later, the President reduced spending by over one hundred million dollars ($100,000,000).
It goes without saying that there have been no Executive Orders directed towards reducing domestic abuse by increasing education to male Americans, or increasing spending on mental health treatment. Furthermore, it is the apex of hypocrisy for President Trump to accuse trans women of attacking cisgendered women. I myself know a woman who admitted to me that she was groped by President Trump against her will before he assumed office, and the news outlets have publicized myriad accounts from myriad women who alleged that President Trump sexually assaulted them. In other words, President Trump believes that men will sexually assault women because President Trump himself has sexually assaulted women – which he freely admitted.
This indicates clearly that President Trump is uninterested in doing the work to actually protect women, but simply seeks to blame a disenfranchised population, that of transgendered women, for the crimes of cisgendered men.
Second, this Executive Order discussed women’s workplace showers. While I have never worked at a location that has workplace showers, I believe the assumption implicit therein is that these showers are communal (this is not necessarily the case, but let’s assume that it is). The point that President Trump implied is that men will be unable to control themselves in a room full of scantily-clad or naked women and that the women will be in danger of sexual assault from predatory men. Again, accounts from contestants in the Miss America pageant (which President Trump owned from 1996-2015) who were required to change backstage in between performances complained that President Trump regularly went backstage while they were changing, and also sexually assaulted them.
Again, no plans were revealed to help prevent sexual assault. As in domestic abuse shelters, women are by far the demographic more likely to suffer from sexual assault, but instead of training men not to assault women, sexually or otherwise, President Trump chose to blame transgendered women for the crimes of cisgendered men. It is noteworthy that the same budget cuts described above that affected funding for domestic violence shelters also affected funding for victims of sexual violence, so again, instead of putting funding into areas where women in particular need it the most, President Trump reduced it by a third.
Our third and final point for today is the commonly mentioned topic of transgendered women in women’s bathrooms. While this is not specifically mentioned in the Executive Order I’m parsing today, it certainly is common enough in certain states and was surely a contributing factor to the issuance of this Executive Order; Florida, Montana, Ohio and Wyoming are some, and you can see here a full list of the specific states and their prohibitions.
When I first came across this topic, I was really, really confused. Why would it matter who was peeing in the stall next to mine? But after thinking about this for a spell, I realized that men who have never been in a women’s restroom don’t know that, unlike in men’s restrooms, there’s no bullpen. Women simply cannot watch each other using the facilities, as we use individual stalls, so unless the person goes under or over the wall dividing each stall, it’s a non-spectator sport. While I repeat that this isn’t mentioned in the Executive Order, it’s something that most men are simply unaware of (this was a big discussion in the Trachtman household while Alan was alive, and he had literally no idea how women’s restrooms were laid out) so I think it’s important to discuss it here for the benefit of my readers, like my father, who never set foot in a women’s restroom.
In the Executive Order, President Trump claimed that he was mandating this recognition of gender as a binary in order to protect women’s “dignity, safety and well-being.” He entirely failed to explain how transgendered women in traditionally cisgendered women’s spaces violates women’s dignity, although the argument can certainly be made that by walking around backstage at the Miss America pageant, President Trump attacked the dignity of those contestants. Furthermore, President Trump has acted against the preservation of women’s wellbeing and safety by stripping over a hundred million dollars of funding from programs that are critical to women, as I discussed above. Finally, for a man who has been repeatedly accused of sexual assault, and who actually admitted to sexually assaulting women, to claim that he does anything for women’s dignity, safety, and wellbeing, is a fucking joke. This Executive Order is nothing but base hypocrisy, fear mongering and pandering to bigots, and nothing about it actually seeks to protect women, as indicated by the complete omission of any language condemning men for committing acts of violence against women.
May 6, 2025
By Laura Trachtman
The Trump administration has claimed to have taken steps to “reverse the role of DEI in hiring.” Specifically, President Trump published an Executive Order related to DEI, and his administration has issued a fact sheet concerning the same. Is it my understanding that the Trump administration feels that DEI hiring is discriminatory towards a certain demographic of the population, that is, cisgendered, heterosexual, Protestant, white men (“CHPWM”), based on the theory that DEI promotes otherwise unqualified individuals to take positions that CHPWM would otherwise have occupied.
There are two main problems with the Trump administration’s position. The first is the position that DEI hires are unqualified for their positions and are only hired because of their membership in a protected class, and the second is the position that new policies were needed to correct the first problem. We’ll tackle these one at a time.
First, to assume that only CHPWM are qualified for roles, and everyone else is unqualified, is an intolerant and ignorant assumption. And yet, this is the assumption that the Trump administration relies upon to promulgate these policies. Personally, I find the Trump administration’s position to be incredibly offensive, idiotic, prejudiced, and just plain wrong. I worry that this will have long-standing effects on the American population, which I will not get into here due to time restraints. But, with a Republican majority in Congress, I fear that we are stuck with these policies – for now.
Second, legally speaking, DEI-related discrimination doesn’t exist, just like reverse racism doesn’t exist. In other words, there’s not one type of discrimination protection for white people and another for people of color: it’s all covered under the same law.
Regardless, the Trump administration provided guidance for employees who feel that they have been discriminated against due to DEI policies; some examples can be found here and here. The long and the short of these publications is that an employer (and others, but for our purposes, we’ll stick with employers) cannot discriminate against an employee based on a protected characteristic, which includes race. While the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission correctly summarized that in its publications, this is nothing new. Since the passage of Title VII in 1964, it has been illegal to discriminate based on race – any race. Many individuals operate under the mistaken belief that it is only illegal to discriminate against someone if they are not white. This is wrong.
Title VII states: “It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer – (1) to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual, or otherwise to discriminate against any individual with respect to his compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment, because of such individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.”
What does this mean? It means that you can’t discriminate against someone based on their race, no matter what that race is.
Why do people think that you can only discriminate based on race if someone is a person of color? This question requires a much longer answer than I have time or space for here, but suffice it to say, people of color are generally treated less favorably than white people in the United States and thus find themselves needing the protection of the law more frequently.
Why the attack on DEI if discrimination based on any race is prohibited? My own theory is that white people are starting to feel that their position as the “preeminent” race in America is threatened. The unique privilege that white Americans have enjoyed for centuries is starting to erode as American employers have finally begun to realize that encouraging diversity, equity, and inclusion in hiring makes a stronger workplace and is better for business. The upshot is that Americans of all races are starting to reach some level of equality; the downshot is that white Americans are feeling insecure and need reassurance that they’re still #1. That’s where President Trump steps in.
By declaring DEI policies discriminatory, President Trump sought to assuage the worries of white Americans regarding their crumbling status in American society. The problem is that it has always been illegal to discriminate based on protected characteristics under Title VII. And while President Trump has claimed that this a big victory for [gestures vaguely], the fact remains that he has made absolutely no changes to the law, and he’s shamming everyone who believes that President Trump has provided any additional protections to white Americans whatsoever.
Special thank you to the creators and writers of Mean Girls for the phrase “Gretchen, stop trying to make fetch happen.”
