Implementing the Executive Order on Sex and Gender

And a few unrelated matters

February 2, 2025

Two days ago, I published a free and shareable podcast episode featuring an interview with the brilliant Glenna Goldis. I received the following anonymous email message in response:

Let’s have a debate between Kara Dansky and Chase Strangio, on all public media.

Strangio is the Co-Director of the ACLU’s LGBT & HIV Project and, until being promoted in July 2024, was the ACLU’s Deputy Director for Transgender Justice. Needless to say, I would be happy to accept an invitation from any media outlet to engage in such a debate. I do not anticipate that one will be forthcoming, however, and even if it were, I highly doubt Strangio (who once screamed at me from across the room during a school board meeting in New York) would agree to do it. I wrote about that meeting here.

But this post is about steps taken just in the past couple of days to implement the January 20 Executive Order “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government” (which I will just call the Executive Order on sex and gender, or, sometimes, order).

I published a preliminary analysis of the order on January 21. Generally speaking, it establishes 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.” It also requires various federal agencies to do various things consistent with that policy.

Some agencies have now taken steps to implement the order. On Friday, for example, it was announced that federal employees would be required to remove “preferred pronouns” from their email signatures. Later in the day, it was announced that the Department of Education would be taking steps to enforce Title IX’s prohibition on sex discrimination (as opposed to “gender identity” discrimination) in education.

Read on to find out what these steps mean (among other things).

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