Kansas' attorney general is moving to block trans people from changing their birth certificates

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Transgender people born in Kansas could be prevented from changing their birth certificates to reflect their gender identities if the state’s conservative Republican attorney is successful with a legal move he launched late Friday.

Attorney General Kris Kobach filed a request in federal court asking a judge to end a requirement that Kansas allow transgender people to change their birth certificates. U.S. District Judge Daniel Crabtree imposed the requirement in 2019 to settle a lawsuit filed by four transgender Kansas residents against three state health department officials over a policy that critics said prevented transgender people from making changes even after transitioning, legally changing their names and obtaining new driver’s licenses and Social Security cards.

It wasn't clear whether Kobach's effort would succeed, given a U.S. Supreme Court decision in 2020 declaring that a federal law barring sex discrimination in employment also prevents discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity. That year, federal judges in Idaho and Ohio struck down rules against transgender people changing their birth certificates, but on Thursday, a federal judge in Tennessee dismissed a lawsuit challenging one of the nation's few remaining state policies against such changes.

Kobach's move appears to be in keeping with a new, sweeping Kansas law taking effect July 1 that rolls back transgender rights, enacted by the Republican-controlled Legislature over Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly's veto. A memo filed electronically with the request shortly before midnight cited the law as a reason to revisit the 2019 settlement.