The Trump administration is ordering federal agencies to bar transgender workers from single-sex facilities that correspond to their gender identity by Friday and to fire any employees working on “gender ideology,” as part of a broad new directive intended to comply with an executive order requiring the government to recognize only two sexes.
The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) issued a memo to department heads on Wednesday instructing them to review and terminate programs, contracts, grants, and outward-facing media that “promote or inculcate gender ideology,” which the administration broadly defines as “an ever-shifting concept of self-assessed gender identity.”
According to a memo obtained by The Hill on Wednesday, federal agency heads should place employees whose job descriptions include “promoting gender ideology” on immediate paid leave by 5 p.m. EST Friday, as well as close offices and programs that support the idea that gender is separate from sex and exists on a spectrum.
The decision orders the cancelation of training and employee resource groups that have previously “promoted gender ideology” and urges agency heads to guarantee that rules, documents, and forms use the term “sex,” not “gender.” According to the email, “intimate spaces” like bathrooms should be “designated by biological sex and not gender identity.”
According to the message, agency heads have until February 7 at noon to report on their implementation efforts.
The OPM did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
Wednesday’s statement details the administration’s next steps in enforcing President Trump’s Jan. 20 executive order stating that the federal government will recognize only two sexes, male and female, which “are not changeable and are grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality.”
The order, which promises to defend women and restore “biological truth to the federal government,” directs federal agencies and employees to “enforce laws governing sex-based rights, protections, opportunities, and accommodations to protect men and women as biologically distinct sexes.”
“Agencies shall take all necessary steps, as permitted by law, to end Federal funding of gender ideology,” said the order, which Trump signed during his first hours in office.
The change in bathroom policy parallels a recent battle waged by House Republicans, who attempted to prevent Rep. Sarah McBride (D-Del.), the only transgender member of Congress, from using the women’s restroom. Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) announced in November a new policy, which he repeated earlier this month, prohibiting transgender people from using restrooms at the Capitol that correspond to their gender identity.
Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) presented a measure late last year that would have prohibited transgender persons from using toilets on federal property, including museums and national parks.
Trump signed three additional executive orders this week aimed at transgender rights, including one that would restrict children’ access to gender-affirming care. An order announced on Wednesday wants to defund public schools that teach critical race theory or “radical gender ideology,” while another seeks to prevent transgender persons from openly serving in the military.
OPM has issued a series of contentious letters in recent days, including a buyout for the majority of the country’s 2 million federal employees.
