Transgender Woman Fights Michigan For Driver's License That Reflects Identity

LANSING (WWJ) The state of Michigan is being challenged in federal court by a person who was born a man but says the state won't change her driver's licence to identify her as a woman.

Tina Seitz of Macomb County transitioned.

The Secretary of State's ruling says that since Tina hasn't had the full surgery to remove male genitalia, she is a man.

But she lives as a woman. "Going through airport lines and security and just producing a driver's license just to show who I am (is difficult)," she told WWJ's Charlie Langton.

Jay Kaplan with the ACLU says Michigan's requirement that the surgery happens before a driver's license can reflect a different gender is unique to the state.

"Michigan is the only state in the country that has this requirement to change the gender on a driver's license," she said. "The majority of states have no requirement that relies upon surgery."

Tired of pleading, Tina has taken her case to the feds.

She's one of six Michigan transgender people who filed a federal lawsuit in May against Secretary of State Ruth Johnson, challenging the state policy. Their suit says the state's rule makes it "impossible or unduly burdensome" to change the gender recorded on their driver's licenses.

"They are forced to carry and show to others a basic identity document that fails to reflect an essential aspect of personhood – their gender," ACLU lawyers argue in the complaint against Johnson, per MLIVE. "Denying Plaintiffs and other transgender people a driver's license that matches their gender identity and lived gender results in the routine disclosure of their transgender status, as well as their medical condition and treatment, to complete strangers."