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Hunter Schaferone of Hollywood’s highest-profile and most in-demand transgender performers, has opened up in a revelatory and rare eight-minute video posted on social media to explain her response to receiving a new passport with her sex listed as male.
“I had a bit of a harsh reality check today and felt like it’s important to share with whoever is listening. So I’m sure most of us remember on, I think the first day of Trump’s presidency, he signed an executive order to declare only two genders recognized by the state — male and female assigned at birth,” said the Euphoria star in her opening comments. “And as a result of this, which I wrote down because I want to get it right, the Borough of Consular Affairs has frozen passport applications requesting a gender marker change or renewals or new applications with a gender marker deferring from an applicant’s gender assigned at birth. My initial reaction to this, because our president is a lot of talk, was like, I’ll believe it when I see it.”
Schafer saw it when she went to pick up a new passport in Los Angeles at the federal passport agency as the 26-year-old actress went to receive a new travel document after having hers stolen while filming recently in Barcelona, Spain. She admits she was “shocked” to see the change after having all of her identification listed to match her gender identity after having transitioned in her teenage years.
“I’m not making this post to fear monger or to create drama or receive consolation. I don’t need it. But I do think it’s worth posting to sort of note the reality of the situation and that it is actually happening,” she continued. “And I was shocked. I was shocked because I don’t know, I just didn’t think it was actually going to happen. I want to acknowledge my privilege not only as a famous or celebrity trans woman who is white and thin and can adhere to contemporary beauty standards, and I can participate in all of that, and I pass and it still happened.”
The executive order, instated when Trump took office on Jan. 20, states that “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.”
The order was just the first of a handful of Trump’s assaults on the transgender community and gender affirming care. He has since signed an executive order prohibiting transgender women and girls from competitive sports as well as banning transgender troops from the military. Trump’s orders have received immediate blowback from both the LGBTQ community, civil rights groups and federal judges that have challenged his authority on the moves.
Another high-profile Hollywood performer, Laverne Cox, recently weighed in on Trump’s actions by stating that the president is worried about “the wrong 1 percent.” Cox added: “Trans folks, I want to remind us that we’ve been here before. Our identities have been criminalized before. Up until the early ‘90s, many cities had anti-crossdressing laws on the books. The brilliant Alexandra Billings has been sharing every single day on her Instagram and TikTok that she transitioned in 1979 and was arrested multiple times just for walking down the street as a trans person. She was arrested and she survived. She got through it, and there are people before her who survived and got through it and we’ll get through it again.”
Read Schafer’s comments in full below.
Hello internet. I don’t really post much these days, but I had a bit of a harsh reality check today and felt like it’s important to share with whoever is listening. So I’m sure most of us remember on, I think the first day of Trump’s presidency, he signed an executive order to declare only two genders recognized by the state, male and female assigned at birth. And as a result of this, which I wrote down because I want to get it right, the Borough of Consular Affairs has frozen passport applications requesting a gender marker change or renewals or new applications with a gender marker deferring from an applicant’s gender assigned at birth. So my initial reaction to this, because our president is a lot of talk, was like, I’ll believe it when I see it. And today I saw it on my new passport male.
So, 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. However, last year when I was filming in Barcelona, our car got broken into and my bag got stolen and inside of that was my passport, which was supposed to last me up until my 30s. And so I got an emergency passport, which was very simple at the time. It’s basically just a copy of my old passport, but temporary and only supposed to be used within the year. So as soon as I got back to the states, I had to get this fixed and get it replaced with a real proper passport, which I went to the federal passport agency today in L.A. and did, I’ve had to do this one time before. No part of the process was different. I filled everything out just like I normally would. I put female, and when it was picked up today and I opened it up, they had changed the marker to male.
I’m not making this post to fear monger or to create drama or receive consolation. I don’t need it. But I do think it’s worth posting to sort of note the reality of the situation and that it is actually happening. And I was shocked. I was shocked because I don’t know, I just didn’t think it was actually going to happen. And I want to acknowledge my privilege not only as a famous or celebrity trans woman who is white and thin and can adhere to contemporary beauty standards, and I can participate in all of that, and I pass and it still happened.
And yeah, I never had my birth certificate changed. So this has led me to believe that I think the agencies who are in charge of passports and this sort of thing are now required to cross-reference birth certificates or I don’t know exactly what or what changed as far as the processing goes, but this is the first time, excuse me, this has happened to me since I changed my gender marker. 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 because things just sort of start happening. I think as we’ve seen in historical rises of fascism and this sort of everything that this new administration kind of represents. There’s a lot of talk and then things start happening and we start to normalize the circumstances were under. And I just feel like it’s important to share that it’s not just talk, that this is real and it’s happening and no one, no matter their circumstance, no matter how wealthy or white or pretty or whatever is excluded, this is real. I also want to say I don’t give a fuck that they put an “M” on my passport. It doesn’t change really anything about me or my transness. However, it does make life a little harder.
Personally, I think, I mean, I haven’t tested it out yet. I’ll find out next week when I have to travel abroad for the first time with my new passport. But I am pretty sure it’s going to come along with having to out myself to border patrol agents and that whole gig much more often than I would like to or is really necessary. And this is just my personal circumstance and thinking about other trans women who this might also be happening to or other trans people. The list only gets longer as far as the intricacies that come along with the difficulty that this brings into real life shit, this is getting very long, but I just want to say trans people are beautiful. We are never going to stop existing. I’m never going to stop being trans. A letter and a passport can’t change that and fuck this administration. And I don’t really have an answer on what to do about this, but I feel it was important to share. This is real. So yeah, fuck.
