The United States has issued its first passport with an “X” gender designation which means that someone is neither exclusively male nor female.
Although, an increasing number of intersex, nonbinary and gender-nonconforming people have come out in recent years, most of them have been unable to obtain IDs that accurately reflect who they want to be identified as because of a patchwork of state laws.
The State Department did not announce to whom the passport was issued.
Jessica Stern,the U.S. Special Envoy to Advance the Human Rights of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer and Intersex (LGBTQI) called the move historic and celebratory. She said that the government documents is brought in line with the “lived reality” that there is a wider spectrum of human sex characteristics than is reflected in the previous two designations.
Stern added that this is a way of affirming and uplifting the human rights of trans, intersex, gender-nonconforming and nonbinary people everywhere.
