Hunter Schafer just took to the internet to let everyone know the ‘harsh reality’ that she is facing after changing her passport.
The ‘Euphoria‘ actress shared an 8-and-a-half-minute video talking about how she now has an “M” placed on her passport and how discouraging the situation is.
“On the first day of Trump’s presidency, he signed an executive order to declare only two genders recognized by the state, male and female, assigned at birth,” Schafer went on to note. “As a result of this, the Bureau of Consular Affairs has frozen passport applications requesting gender marking changes or renewals.”
While she claimed, “I’ll believe it when I see it,” the model and actress had a rude awakening when she picked up her new passport. She went on to say it was the first time it had happened since her teenage years.
She went on to add, “I’m not making this post to fear-monger, or to create drama, or receive consolation, I don’t need it,” she said. “But I do think it’s worth posting to sort of note the reality of the situation and that it’s happening. I was shocked. I just didn’t think it was actually going to happen.”
Schafer later shared that her bag containing her old passport was stolen in Barcelona, prompting her to apply for a new one. Despite having updated her gender markers on various forms of identification over the past decade, Schafer never changed the gender on her birth certificate, leading to the reversion of the marker.
“It’s not just talk,” she said. “This is real. And it’s happening. No one, no matter their circumstance, no matter how wealthy or white or pretty or whatever, is excluded. This is real.”
Schafer emphasized that resistance is always an option. “I don’t give a f*ck that they put an ‘M’ on my passport,” she added. “It doesn’t change really anything about me or my transness. However, it does make life a little harder. I’m pretty sure it’s gonna come along with having to out myself to border patrol agents and that whole gig much more often than I would like to or is really necessary.”
She ended her video with an uplifting message for the transgender community. “Trans people are beautiful. We are never going to stop existing. We are never going to stop being trans. A letter on a passport can’t change that… and f*ck this administration.”
Schafer uploaded the video to her TikTok story, but it was quickly removed. Links to the video displayed a message reading, “Page not available.” It remains unclear whether Schafer took it down herself or if TikTok removed it.
