“Euphoria” and “Cuckoo” star Hunter Schafer is sounding the alarm on President Donald Trump’s anti-trans executive order inked in January, in which he proclaimed that the United States will only recognize two genders: biologically male and biologically female.
In an eight-minute video posted to Schafer’s social media, the actress reveals that Trump’s order has already impacted her after a passport renewal led to her gender marker being changed from female to male.
“Now, to specify, my gender markers were first changed in my teens, when I first got my driver’s license and then passports following all have been female since then . . . Hasn’t really been a problem,” she says in the video.
“I don’t know exactly what changed as far as the processing goes, but this is the first time this has happened to me since I changed my gender marker,” Schafer continues. “We’re coming up on a decade now, or something. And I do believe it is a direct result of the administration our country is currently operating under. And I guess I’m just sort of scared of the way this stuff slowly gets implemented.”
Elsewhere in the video, Schafer acknowledges that she doubted Trump’s order would actually be enacted, referring to Trump as being “a lot of talk.”
Schafer explains that she likely would not have been impacted by this new order so soon, had she not had to apply for an emergency passport after the original copy was stolen.
“I put female, and when it was picked up today and I opened it up, they had changed the marker to male,” she says, describing her surprise at receiving her new passport.
The actress goes on to specify that her intent with the video was not to fearmonger or “create drama or receive consolation,” emphasizing if this can happen to a privileged, trans celebrity then this could happen to trans people far more disenfranchised than her.
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“I also want to say, I don’t give a f**k that they put a M on my passport. It doesn’t change really anything about me or my transness, however, it does make life a little harder,” Schafer says. “Trans people are beautiful. We are never going to stop existing, I am never going to stop being trans, a letter on a passport can’t change that. And f**k this administration.”
Earlier this month, the ACLU reported that seven people were suing the Trump administration for an allegedly “discriminatory and dangerous” passport policy that barred transgender, intersex and nonbinary people from being issued a passport with the gender they identified with instead of the sex they were assigned at birth.
This comes from a mandate in the executive order that now demands federal agencies require that government-issued identification documents — including passports, visas and Global Entry cards — reflect people’s sex “at conception.”
Despite Schafer using her platform to address the passport issue, she objects to being labeled an activist by the press, even though she has had firm roots in activism. She first made headlines in 2016 when she was the youngest name listed on an ACLU lawsuit against a North Carolina bill prohibiting trans people from using the bathroom most appropriate for their gender identity. Schafer said she does not see herself as a trans activist because she just happens to be “a person who’s part of a marginalized community in the public eye.”
Other LGBTQ+ celebrities have also raised similar concerns following Trump’s targeting of transgender people. “RuPaul’s Drag Race” judge Michelle Visage said in response to GLAAD reposting Trump’s inauguration speech, “You will not erase my child you POS.”
Cynthia Lee Fontaine replied, “Trash. But we will continue to ensure we will continue with our rights. We will NOT be silent.”
While accepting her award for Best Pop Duo at the Grammys, Lady Gaga said, “I just want to say tonight that trans people are not invisible. Trans people deserve love.”
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