For years, supporters of Donald Trump’s platform assured us we were overreacting. With every viral clip of his outdated quips about gender, our stomachs sank. But we were told to toughen up.
They dismissed his rhetoric as harmless — not hate speech, not transphobia, just jokes. We were told to not be so sensitive, reassured it was all for show, a strategy to provoke liberals.
“No real harm will come,” they said. “You’re inflating the problems.” The “real” concerns were inflation, gas prices and the cost of bread. They insisted we would be safe, that we would go on living as we had.
But this was a lie. Words matter. And his words turned into immediate action.
Now, those words can no longer be denied, ignored or misheard, they have materialized into our shared reality — a nightmare for my community.
This was not a subtle, slow erosion of trans and nonbinary rights; it was swift and blunt. From the highest office in the nation, with the world watching, Donald Trump declared his administration’s mission within moments of taking the presidency: to redefine gender strictly as male or female.
Unlike the rhetoric at his rallies — stirring emotions and spouting disinformation to be dismissed later as “just talk” — these words were translated into immediate, tangible policies by his staff.
On his first day in office, an executive order was signed mandating a federal definition of sex as binary. This dangerous ideology was more than symbolic; it came with devastating consequences for trans and nonbinary people like me.
Within days, memos circulated halting passport updates for nonbinary individuals and denying gender marker changes. Policies shifted to redefine our identities from government documents, from housing in federal prisons to basic recognition.
Each restrictive move felt like a direct assault. The speed and ferocity of these actions made it brutally clear — attempting to erase the trans and nonbinary community was not incidental; it was a priority.
America has an ugly history of using policy to strip people of their rights and identities. And tragically, when this happens, the majority remains silent, untouched and unbothered until it is too late. For most, these actions were just another day of boring bureaucracy. For me and my community, they were death warrants.
I have witnessed firsthand the harms of not having your identification reflect who you are. It puts us in positions of vulnerability — from mental health struggles to physical violence. As someone living and working in Houston, Texas, I’ve seen the state government remove avenues for updating gender markers without being subjected to formalized scrutiny. This feeling of unsafety and distrust is nothing new to us.
Yet the endless debates over whether Trump has “erased” our identities are infuriating. A memo, an executive order, a law cannot erase me. My heart still beats. My existence is not dependent on their recognition.
Trans, nonbinary, genderqueer — we exist. No document, no policy can erase a human being or overpower a movement built on visibility, love and resilience.
Our history cannot be wiped away.
We remember, and we will be remembered. The names of Nex Benedict, Matthew Shepard, and so many others in our community lost to hate crimes remain with us, even when the Trump administration erased their tributes from government websites within days of taking office.
\References to LGBTQ+ identities and HIV-related resources vanished overnight from WhiteHouse.gov and federal agency pages. Yet we will persist with or without their support.
We will continue to share our knowledge, our history, our stories with each other to continue our survival.
Attempts at erasure are not new to us; it is a challenge we have faced throughout history — from colonial powers to systemic oppression in modern governments. And every time they try to deny us our humanity, we rise again.
Every morning, I wake up knowing that myself, my trans sisters and brothers and my gender-diverse siblings across the world resist simply by living openly and authentically.
No executive order can change the fact that I am a loved daughter, a loyal friend, a hard worker, a fearless change maker, a human being. It does not stop me from going into work every day to fight for Black queer liberation.
It cannot stop the powerful gatherings of trans women of color I witness weekly at the Trans Ally Collective. It cannot stop me from organizing a festival of Black queer voices to speak louder than ever this year in Texas. It does not stop me from believing there will be better days for us to come.
This fight is not easy, and the path forward will test us. But the history of trans activism is one of persistence. Those who came before us fought for the right to live openly, and we refuse to allow that progress to be undone for the sake of any administration’s political agenda.
To my trans sisters and brothers, my nonbinary and genderqueer siblings and anyone crushed by these devastating policies, know this: Our very act of breathing terrifies those who seek to silence us. Our moments of happiness are a rebellion. Our mere existence is resistance.
For the next four years and beyond, we will not duck our heads or disappear. We will laugh loudly and live joyously in defiance of any administration, system or ideology that tries to strip away our humanity. Our history cannot be erased, it is written in permanent ink on this earth.
t will not fade. It is written in bold, just as we are.
Joelle Bayaa-Uzuri Espeut (she/her/hers) is the program director for The Normal Anomaly Initiative.