These trans kids and their families are fighting to overturn discriminatory birth certificate policies

Most parents would do just about anything to protect their children; Katie Jenifer, the mother of a 14-year-old trans girl, M.D., went to law school.  

“It was a family decision, but it was just one thing after another of ridiculous gatekeeping, barriers and restrictions that have no reason for being other than people are scared of what they don’t understand,” Jenifer tells Xtra over the phone. “Nobody wants to do the work to understand.”

But even as Jenifer has fought tirelessly on her daughter’s behalf, those battles have been constant. One recurring issue is that their home state, North Carolina, does not allow trans residents to correct the gender marker listed on their birth certificate without first undergoing gender-affirming surgery—which is still years away from M.D., who is now 14. Jenifer says there are “no plans” for her daughter to surgically transition “anytime soon.”

Jenifer received her law degree from North Carolina Central University in May and is licensed to practice after passing the bar exam. She says she was inspired to pursue a career in legal advocacy because she was tired of “being pissed off all the time” about the discrimination her daughter faces. On M.D.’s first day of school, a camera crew showed up to ask parents how they felt about their children attending kindergarten with a trans child. M.D. has been referred to as “it” by other students and prevented from using the girls’ restroom, forced to use the faculty bathroom instead. 

Not having a birth certificate that reflects her gender identity makes M.D. particularly vulnerable to further mistreatment. When she was just eight years old, a county softball team forced her to present her birth records in order to continue playing, even though she had already been competing on the girls’ team for months. 

“It’s been hard, but if they push me down, I get back up,” M.D. tells Xtra. “A lot of trans kids don’t have support from their families, and I’m just happy that my family is very supportive of everything I do. That’s why we need better policies to protect us.”

To help advocate for trans youth who lack those same resources, Jenifer and M.D. joined a litigation challenging North Carolina’s birth certificate regulations. A lawsuit filed by Lambda Legal in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina earlier this month alleges that the state’s guidelines violate the constitutional guarantee of equal protection under the 14th Amendment and should be struck down.

Lambda Legal has successfully challenged discriminatory birth certificate laws in states such as Idaho, Kansas and Ohio—all of which previously banned trans people from amending the gender marker on their birth records in any form. Just one state still prohibits gender corrections on birth certificate: Tennessee (legal action against the policy is currently pending).

“As flawed as our legal system is, I truly believe that the guarantee of our constitution is to protect everybody.”

If Lambda Legal is successful in North Carolina, the win would represent a major first: of more than a dozen states that require some form of affirming surgery before trans individuals are allowed to change the gender marker on their birth certificates, none have ever been forced to drop the policy.

Omar Gonzalez-Pagan, a senior attorney at Lambda Legal, says he is “confident” that courts will continue to uphold the trans community’s right to “privacy, equality, autonomy and liberty.

“As flawed as our legal system is, I truly believe that the guarantee of our constitution is to protect everybody,” he tells Xtra. “I have seen it work time and time again for the benefit of our clients and so many others. It’s not an easy road. It’s full of twists and turns, but I am quite confident that the trajectory that we go in is one of more respect, acceptance and broadened recognition of our rights.” 

Two other plaintiffs have joined the Lambda Legal suit: Lillith Campos, a trans woman who has been unable to get gender affirmation surgery because it’s not covered by her employer’s health plan, and C.B., a 16-year-old high school student. (Because both M.D. and C.B. are minors, they are referred to by their initials in the Lambda Legal lawsuit. Their parents have asked that this article not include their names for privacy reasons.)

A major problem with North Carolina’s birth certificate policy is that trans students without corrected documentation can be outed at any time, according to C.B.’s mother, Shelley Bunting. The state uses the software program PowerSchool to store information about student records, and it’s impossible to change a student’s “gender marker in PowerSchool when you have an inaccurate birth certificate,” Bunting tells Xtra.

“Kids continue to be misgendered over and over again because PowerSchool says that they’re [another] gender,” she says. “If it happens once, then there’s always a worry every time you walk into a classroom. All it takes is one time for the fear to then always be there.”

“I should be in control of who knows that I’m transgender.”

C.B. adds, however, that trans students who haven’t yet been misgendered and outed because of PowerSchool still live in fear they will be someday. Although C.B. is out at his progressive high school and has his gender marker corrected on other documents, like his U.S. passport, he says that he shouldn’t be put in the position of being forced to explain himself to “anyone who sees the wrong gender marker.

“I should be in control of who knows that I’m transgender,” C.B. says, “and having an incorrect birth certificate takes the control away from me.”

This terror is one Jenifer and her daughter know well. Students at M.D.’s school are required to submit vaccination records every year, and even if she provides a doctor’s note from an affirming physician, there’s always the possibility a school nurse will open her file and see an uncorrected gender marker on her birth certificate. Such an occurrence is not purely hypothetical: M.D. has already been outed several times in the past, including in a Facebook group for local parents.

“It’s just discriminatory,” Jenifer says. “She lives full time—and has since she was six years old—as a girl. It’s a barrier for her to have a normal life experience just like any other girl in North Carolina.”

If the state’s birth certificate policy were struck down as a result of the lawsuit, M.D. looks forward to being able to focus on just being an ordinary teenager. Before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, M.D. was co-captain of her school’s cheerleading squad, and she hopes to be a photojournalist someday (although she admits that she’s “probably going to change my mind between then and now”).

“I’m just a normal kid trying to get through high school and to make my mark as a human,” M.D. says. “I really hope that with this I can put my voice out there and help other students not have to go through the hard stuff that I went through.”