RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 10 contestant Aja threatens legal action after passport gender marker changed to ‘male’
RuPaul’s Drag Race star and trans musician Aja (Getty)
RuPaul's Drag Race star and trans musician Aja (Getty)
RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 10 star Aja has revealed that a new passport issued by the US government has been stamped with an ‘M’ gender marker.
The drag star and rap artist, who came out as a transgender woman in 2021, explained in a lengthy post on her social media that her previous passport was stamped with an ‘F’ gender marker, meaning female.
Yet after she lost her passport and filed for a replacement, the re-issued document came stamped with an ‘M’ gender marker, meaning male.
The 31-year-old star said that every document she had submitted to support the passport reissue declared her as female, and that she didn’t request her gender marker change.
“When I said that having a document with incorrect information puts me in danger traveling internationally, I was denied escalation, refused further documentation, and sent out the door with paperwork and a pat on the head,” she wrote in a post on Facebook on Thursday (22 May).
“Now I’m being forced to choose between my safety and my career — between flying with a passport that outs me at every checkpoint, or canceling tens of thousands of dollars in international work I’m booked for.”
Aja suggested that the US government had “violated [her] First Amendment [right] by erasing [her] identity” and “violated Fourteenth [Amendment] by denying [her] equal protection”.
“This isn’t a clerical error. This is a federal fumble with my life in the crosshairs,” she continued, insinuating that she would be pursuing legal action.
“And if they thought I’d carry this passport in silence? They forgot who the f**k I am.
“I’m not going down. I’m going public. I’m going legal. And I’m dragging the system with me!”
Aja, who recently made it through the preliminary round of the competition on RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 10, is one in a growing list of celebrities speaking out about their passports being stamped with incorrect gender markers.
In February, Euphoria star Hunter Schafer slammed president Donald Trump and his administration’s attacks on the trans community after she was given a new passport listing her as “male”.
Fellow RuPaul’s Drag Race alum Adore Delano, who came out as a trans woman in 2023, revealed in March that she had also been provided with a passport listing her as “male”.
The increasing number of passports recording trans women as male is the result of Trump signing an executive order back in January which ruled that there are only two sexes, male and female, which are assigned at birth.
“These sexes are not changeable and are grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality,” the order outlines.
“‘Sex’ is not a synonym for and does not include the concept of ‘gender identity’.”
The US State Department, which hands out passports, also removed the option to select “X” as a gender marker for non-binary people.
Trans Americans and campaigners have called Trump’s executive order an effective travel ban, as a rising number of trans folk in the country have reported having trouble getting their passport processed due to the difference between their selected gender marker and biological sex.
In April, federal judge Julia Kobick ruled that the Trump administration’s policy of refusing to give passports to transgender and non-binary people that reflect their gender identities is likely unconstitutional.
A number of trans entertainers, including Canadian singer Bells Larsen, have also been forced to pull out of US tours owing to the government’s new rules surrounding passports and visas, as trans or non-binary visitors may encounter trouble with their documentation when applying for visas or trying to enter America.
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