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Federal Bureau of Prisons issued a memo directing transfer of transgender inmates to facilities matching birth sex and cutting affirming care

On February 21, 2025, the Federal Bureau of Prisons issued a memo implementing President Trump's Executive Order 14168, directing staff to refer to transgender inmates by the legal name and pronouns matching their sex assigned at birth, barring the use of funds for gender-affirming items and care, and suspending clothing and pat-search accommodations and support programs previously offered to transgender inmates. The memo laid the groundwork to transfer transgender women out of women's facilities into men's facilities based on sex assigned at birth. Affected women were moved into segregated housing pending transfer, and those slated for men's prisons faced the cutoff of their hormone treatments.

Jurisdiction
federal
Location
Washington, D.C.

Abuses documented

Actors

  • Federal Bureau of Prisons (issuing agency)

The Federal Bureau of Prisons issued an internal memo on February 21, 2025, translating President Trump's Executive Order 14168 into operational policy across the federal prison system. The memo directed staff to refer to transgender inmates using the legal name and pronouns corresponding to their sex assigned at birth, prohibited the use of appropriated funds for gender-affirming items and medical care, and suspended clothing and pat-search accommodations along with support programs that had previously been available to transgender people in custody.

The central effect of the directive was to lay the groundwork for transferring transgender women held in women's facilities into men's facilities based on sex assigned at birth. In the days surrounding the memo, affected women were removed from the general population of their prisons and placed into segregated housing pending transfer, and those on the list to be moved to men's prisons faced the termination of their ongoing hormone treatments.

Because the Bureau of Prisons holds these individuals in its exclusive custody, the policy placed a population with no ability to protect itself at heightened risk of assault and abrupt withdrawal of established medical care, prompting litigation that would follow over the subsequent months.

Updates

2026-06-07 — Federal judge blocked transfer of 14 transgender women to men's prisons [2]

U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth issued a preliminary injunction barring the Bureau of Prisons from transferring 14 transgender women in its custody to men's facilities, finding the transfers would likely violate their Eighth Amendment rights. In a companion case, Lamberth also temporarily blocked the administration's effort to taper and end hormone therapy for transgender people in federal prison; the Justice Department sought a stay of that order.

Why we recorded this

Equal protection and the Eighth Amendment's guarantee of humane treatment in custody mean the government cannot single out incarcerated people for adverse treatment based on who they are. This Bureau of Prisons memo implemented EO 14168 inside the federal prison system: directing staff to address transgender inmates by the name and pronouns matching their sex assigned at birth, cutting off funding for gender-affirming items and care, suspending clothing and search accommodations, and laying the groundwork to transfer transgender women out of women's facilities into men's facilities. The archive records when a federal custodial agency translates a discriminatory executive order into concrete directives that strip protections from a vulnerable population it holds in its exclusive control.

Sources

  1. Bureau of Prisons to move trans inmates as early as this week — NPR primary accessed July 4, 2026
  2. Federal judge blocks Trump admin's effort to move 14 trans women to men's prisons — Law Dork investigative accessed July 4, 2026

See also