Florida DMV Threatens Trans People With Jail For Crime Of 'Getting License To Drive'

Didn't know the DMV could sentence you to any jail besides 'DMV.'

Gender as a thing distinct from sex is not new: Academics have noted and studied the difference for many decades now. The first Women’s Studies program in the United States formed at San Diego State in 1970, and they were sure as hell talking about this then.

For Republicans in Florida, however, this is news. They have just now realized that they have been using the “sex” marker on driver licenses as a “gender” marker when one or the other (or both) differs from narrow-minded expectations. The procedures for changing these markers as may be necessary are often arcane and hard to find, even for DMV clerks (trust me on this). Florida, being the DeSantis-infested political python hole that it is, has determined that this is definitely a problem. And it must be solved!

To solve this tuxedo wrapped in a cocktail dress sporting a monocle and top hat balanced upon some understated five-inch rhinestone Saeda Suede Crystal Ankle-Strap Platform Sandals by Jimmy Choo, the deputy executive director of the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, FloridaMan ID Code “Robert Kynoch,” has issued new regulations for issuing licenses and state ID cards — no legislative action required! — collapsing gender and sex into a single category, which is biological sex.

The laws themselves are a mess of sex and gender terminology. FS § 322.08 requires license applicants to supply proof of “Full name (first, middle or maiden, and last), gender, [and] proof of social security card number satisfactory to the department” but per statute lists “sex” on the face of the card. (This might be something that the state might wish to fix at some point.) Undeterred by potential confusion for Floridians however, the portion of Kynoch’s memo leaked to the public includes no thought of public education or notice. Instead it leaps naturally to the more reasonable and immediate concern: jailing trans folks.

[T]he term “gender” in s. 322.08, F.S., does not refer to a person’s internal sense of his or her gender role or identification. […]

Establishing gender on a newly issued Florida Driver License is based on the supporting documents provided with an application. … Furthermore, misrepresenting one’s gender, understood as sex, on a driver license constitutes fraud under s. 322,212, F.S. [sic], and subjects an offender to criminal and civil penalties, including cancelation, suspension, or revocation.

Emphasis mine. Alejandra Caraballo generously interprets Florida to be threatening to prosecute trans people who change or attempt to change their gender/sex signifier on or after January 26, 2024.

Let’s take a gander at the relevant bit of § 322.212:

(1) It is unlawful for any person to:

(a) Knowingly have in his or her possession or to display any blank, forged, stolen, fictitious, counterfeit, or unlawfully issued driver license or identification card

The state certainly appears to intend Caraballo’s reading, given that driver licenses issued to people whose sex and gender diverge according the prior procedure were presumably lawfully issued at the time. That said, it doesn’t entirely rule out the idea that prior procedures erroneously violated the law. In fact, Kynoch himself asserts this — “The provisions of IR08-Gender Requirements (Revised 05.16.22) are not supported by statutory authority” — thus potentially making the cards retroactively unlawfully issued. Trans people have long been stereotyped as liars attempting to defraud others. This perception of fraud where no fraud existed will only be bolstered under the new regulations.

This is, to use the latin term, “not good.” Trans interactions with police have been particularly dangerous going back beyond Stonewall. Inevitably trans folks are going to be showing some of these IDs to actual cops and that can get complicated, not always in the way that one might expect. With proper ID, a trans person passing as cis slips through society unnoticed and thus untargeted. A trans person not passing as cis may choose not to change ID and might be unaffected by this memo. But a trans person passing as cis whose ID is revoked may be in trouble.

The 19th News quotes Nikole Parker, a trans woman and chief operating officer of the LGBT+ Center Orlando:

“If that thing says ‘male,’ and somebody looks at me and looks at that, that just puts a giant target on my back,” Parker said. “And I think that’s the intentionality behind it, is to be able to easily identify who the trans and nonbinary people are in the state.”

And if making trans people visible to more easily target them is the intention, more trans masculine folks who more frequently and easily pass under the radar may be affected than trans feminine folks. We also have to worry not only about the trans people who might be abused interacting with police in public, but what happens when a trans person who has undergone medical treatment is booked into jail and has no way to distinguish themselves from a drag performer who can take clothing off. Historically this hasn’t worked out well.

And if a prosecutor wanted to make trans lives hell? Even if they couldn’t secure a conviction for presenting an old license, indicting any trans person who uses their current license for everyday activities like opening a bank account or registering to vote isn’t much of a stretch. Certainly not for Florida. And while Donald Trump isn’t right about much, his rants about prosecutions as punishment contain the grain of truth that whether convicted or not, being charged with a crime carries stress, uncertainty and expense that are their own punishments, the 14th Amendment notwithstanding.

Now consider that many states issue official copies of amended birth certificates indistinguishable from those of unamended birth certificates. This is certainly true of California, where I was born. Without any effort at public education, well-meaning trans people gaining or renewing a driver license can easily be engaged in an act the state views as fraud. A single uneducated DMV clerk can put a trans person in the sights of prosecutors not only for the license, but for every subsequent act of presentation. Everything from writing a check to joining a gym could be another count of fraud punishable by up to five years in prison, or ten if you have two prior convictions.

Let’s not even think of what DeSantis’s voter integrity squad would do to those trying to register to vote. Untrained poll workers are notorious for suspecting trans people of voter fraud. The problem is bad enough that I was warned by older trans women to always vote absentee. Early on I did not take that good advice and was flagged by a worker in liberal Portland. A supervisor pulled me aside and spoke to me. Things worked out, but in rural Florida when the governor has made a weapon of prosecuting voters? The risk is particularly large because poll workers are so inadequately trained.

Without ID that reflects how a person actually interacts with the world, the ID no longer functions as “identification.” Far from “frustrat[ing] the state’s ability to enforce its laws,” the renewed conflation of sex and gender will lead to at least as much confusion as it attempts to dispel.

The end result is a catch-22: Either be prosecuted for fraud by the state or be targeted for constant suspicion. This isn’t unique to Florida. It’s part of a trend that seeks to bar trans candidates for office, define gender out of existence, and legally classify human beings as obscene.

The consequences for trans people are dangerous, and for society are ill-conceived. But Kynoch knows who butters his bread:

The Department has undertaken a review of current practices, policies, and directives to better align the services provided by the Department and its partners to our stakeholders.

Ah, “stakeholders.” Presumably the only ones who matter are Herr DeSantis himself and that nice lady from Moms For Liberty with the unconventional marital goings-on. Never has there been a more blandly bureaucratic way to say "trans lives don't matter."