Trans Floridians Protest New License Rules with DMV Die-Ins

Trans Floridians are protesting because of a leaked memo that revokes the ability to change gender markers on driver’s licenses.

On January 31, legal analyst Alejandra Cabello posted a leaked memo from the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles (FLHSMV) to X. The memo was dated January 26 and written by the FLHSMV deputy executive director Robert Kynoch and stated that Florida had immediately ended its policy of letting people update their driver’s license gender markers. It also stated that changing one’s legal gender marker to something different from the gender a person is assigned at birth is considered fraud, and could be subject to criminal penalties. The memo was later sent to and verified by CNN and other news outlets. 

In response to this leaked memo, trans Floridians organized and participated in die-ins at their respective FLHSMV locations on February 9. The demonstrators held their positions for 37 minutes to represent the 37 percent of Floridians who experienced negative repercussions for presenting an ID with a different gender marker than their gender presentation.

These protestors laid on the ground with signs shaped like gravestones that included sayings such as “killed by DMV,” “El DMV de la Florida me mato” (the Florida DMV killed me), and “muerte por DeSantis” (Death by DeSantis). 

Lana Dunn, a local Florida transgender activist, expressed her frustration with the new policy after already going through the process to legally change her name to Watermark, a Central Florida LGBTQ+ publication, saying “I had to go through notaries; I had to go through court, and I had to jump through absolute hoops to make that happen, only to get to this juncture and be shut down on changing my gender marker to reflect who I really am. That’s deeply insulting and offensive.” 

The goal of these protests was to raise awareness and encourage people to send emails and other messages to the White House to convince the federal government to intervene.