Background
Six nonbinary people born in Puerto Rico asked the territory’s Demographic Registry to add an “X” option to the form used to change the gender marker on a birth certificate. The existing form offered only “female” and “male.” After the Registry denied their request, the plaintiffs sued Puerto Rico officials, alleging violations of the federal Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses, the First Amendment, and the Puerto Rico Constitution.
The District of Puerto Rico granted summary judgment to the plaintiffs on their equal-protection claim. It concluded that the policy distinguished between people with binary and nonbinary gender identities and lacked a rational basis. The court ordered Puerto Rico to amend its application promptly to include an “X” option. Puerto Rico appealed, and the First Circuit stayed that order pending appeal.
The Court’s Holding
The First Circuit vacated the summary-judgment order and remanded for further proceedings. Assuming without deciding that rational-basis review applied and that the policy facially classified transgender people according to whether their gender identity was binary or nonbinary, the court held that the policy had a conceivable rational relationship to Puerto Rico’s legitimate interest in protecting privacy.
Puerto Rico began permitting binary gender-marker changes after an earlier district-court ruling held that denying such changes forced transgender binary people to disclose their transgender status, violating their privacy rights. The present plaintiffs, by contrast, waived any comparable privacy argument and conceded at oral argument that an “X” marker inherently discloses nonbinary status. Because rational-basis review permits consideration of any reasonably conceivable justification, not merely the reasons advanced by the government, the plaintiffs failed to negate every rational basis for the distinction. The First Circuit did not decide the plaintiffs’ remaining constitutional claims or require Puerto Rico to offer an “X” marker.
Key Takeaways
- Puerto Rico’s refusal to provide an “X” birth-certificate marker survives rational-basis review based on the record and arguments before the First Circuit.
- A court applying rational-basis review may consider any reasonably conceivable justification for a classification, even one the government did not raise.
- The panel assumed without deciding both that rational-basis review governed and that the policy classified transgender binary and nonbinary people differently.
Why It Matters
The decision reverses the order that would have required Puerto Rico to add an “X” option, while leaving further proceedings to the district court. It underscores the demanding burden equal-protection plaintiffs face under rational-basis review: they must negate every fairly conceivable connection between the classification and a legitimate governmental interest.
The ruling is narrow. It does not establish that nonbinary-marker restrictions are universally constitutional, decide whether another level of scrutiny could apply, or resolve the plaintiffs’ due-process, First Amendment, and Puerto Rico constitutional claims.