The Oct. 8 executive order allowing changes to gender markers on Virgin Islands identification was necessary, Gov. Albert Bryan Jr. said Wednesday, to avoid confusion during ID checks.
Police or other authorities need to quickly ensure a person is who they say they are when checking government-issued ID, Bryan said during a televised press conference.
“You may have someone who has a driver’s license that is presenting as a male, but the person the police officer is stopping is a female. That’s a problem because I don’t know if this person is who they’re saying they are. So you have to create ways for people to legally change their gender,” he said.
Creating a process to change one’s gender was no less important than having a legal process for changing a name, the governor said.
“Sex and gender are two different things. In the Virgin Islands there’s only sex, male and female. Gender, what you present as or what you feel you are is something a little different,” he said. “Many people were surprised by my executive order.”
Some critics had questioned why Bryan would initiate the government’s response to cultural shifts unilaterally, suggesting such changes should go through the legislative process where testimony and debate would be open to public scrutiny.
Bryan, who was out of the territory when the executive order was issued, pushed back, saying he had sent the measure to the Legislature nearly two years ago. In November 2024, the bill stalled in the Senate’s Homeland Security, Justice and Public Safety Committee.
“There’s a lot of mixed emotional feelings there and they tabled the document in the initial hearing,” Bryan said. “As leaders, as regulators, as policymakers, we cannot simply ignore things that are going on in our community.”
Other critics, especially social media posters, said such a change was out of line with Virgin Islands traditions. The governor said people were entitled to their opinions but he was governor for all Virgin Islanders.
“There are a lot of things in this world that we may not like or that may not support but the fact is, as governor of the Virgin Islands, I have to address all these issues and be able to encourage the Legislature to set up policy and regulation around how do we manage our government and how do we manage our people,” Bryan said.
Although the press was invited to attend the press conference, the remote access links did not connect. Possibly unaware that media were not able to virtually attend, Bryan said he’d hoped reporters would have joined to ask questions. Instead, Source reporters watched the broadcast on Government House’s social media page.
Bryan’s executive order did not address several aspects of gender identity. Questions sent to Bryan’s media relations team about the executive order and other topics were not addressed by the governor in the broadcast.
Left unanswered were details about how the executive order might be applied. It’s less straightforward than some social media commenters surmised.
To change their gender on government identification, a person must be over 18 or have a parent or legal guardian’s permission. They must also have a written statement from their licensed health care provider “stating that the individual has an intersex condition” and that a new gender designation was appropriate. Or, the person must go to court and get a judicial order granting a gender change designation.
Biologically, intersex refers to individuals born with natural variations in sex characteristics— such as chromosomes, hormone levels, or reproductive anatomy. It is distinct from being transgender, which relates to a person’s gender identity rather than their biological sex traits.
The process of getting a judicial order was not clear, however, nor were the requirements a judge might seek. The new policy also didn’t seem to address people who identify as neither male nor female. In such cases, some municipalities have allowed for an X rather than the traditional F or M on an ID card.
Bryan said Wednesday that the Senate ought to give the policy a firm legal footing by codifying a version of it into law.
“I encourage the Legislature to pick up this issue because I think it needs discussion and I think it needs firm policy to establish that you can be born a male but identify as a female. And if that is the case, I think we need to make legal space for that. It helps in terms of tracking people — if they commit a crime or if they’re lost. It helps in terms of being able to identify who you are dealing with, documents you have to fill out for your job. Whether you are defined as a male or female, that’s the most common question on any questionnaire. And you don’t want to put people in a situation where they are … actually forced to lie about what gender they are because their paper, their documentation does not reflect the same,” Bryan said.
According to Bryan’s executive order, at least 30 states, Puerto Rico, and Washington, D.C. have simple processes for changing gender designations on driver’s licenses.
