PHOENIX — State lawmakers can’t block transgender individuals from getting an amended birth certificate unless they first have surgery, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday.
The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals said Arizona law does say that one method of getting the state to change a person’s gender on the official state document is to have sex-reassignment surgery.
But Judge Roopali Desai, writing for the court, rejected arguments by Senate President Warren Petersen and House Speaker Steve Montenegro that such a decision is the sole method of getting the sex marker changed on the certificate. She said there’s another statute that also directs the Department of Health Services to make changes when ordered to do so by a court.
