Kansas Ends Gender Identity Changes on Birth Certificates for Transgender Individuals

Kansas will no longer change the gender identities on birth certificates to reflect transgender individuals, citing a new law that defines male and female as a person's sex assigned at birth. The law, which took effect in July after the governor's veto was overridden, requires state agencies to identify individuals as either male or female at birth for data collection purposes. Legal battles ensued between the governor and the state attorney general, resulting in a federal judge ruling that Kansas officials were no longer obligated to change birth certificates. The Kansas Department of Health and Environment announced that it would no longer process gender identity amendments to birth certificates, but those who had already made changes would be allowed to keep their updated certificates. A separate lawsuit is ongoing to require driver's licenses to list an individual's sex at birth.