Orlando proponents of transgender rights level State “die-in.”

In a planned opposition against the state’s new move to stop gender changes on driver’s licenses, about ten people staged ‘die-ins’ in Orlando on Friday, joining activists in five different Florida cities who laid down at DMV offices, pretending to be dead.

In order to increase affirming spaces and resources for LGBTQ+ children, South Florida high school students founded the volunteer PRISM, which organized the protests.

Maxx Fenning, the founder and executive director of PRISM, claims that unlike other types of protests, which are frequently audible, a “die-in” tends to be purposefully solemn and quiet.

Fenning remarked, “Sometimes the point is the quietness.” It is intended to bring notice to the harm and danger while also demonstrating the loss of life caused by these decisions in a very visually effective manner.

Florida’s Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles (FLHSMV) issued a memo late last month prohibiting Floridians from changing the gender marker on their driver’s licenses, which led to the statewide demonstrations on Friday.

The letter overturns earlier instructions to company personnel to permit gender changes on Florida driver’s licenses. The Movement Advancement Project (MAP), a progressive nonprofit, claims that Florida and Kansas are currently the only two states in the United States that forbid such updates.

Duerig, Molly/News from WMFE

On February 9, 2024, six “die-out” protests were staged outside Florida DMV offices, and transgender rights activists in Orlando took part in one of them.

Jude Speegle, 29, of Volusia County, said, “It feels terrible to know that there are individuals today in Florida who will not be able to achieve that step for their transition.” Imagine how it would affect your mental health if people didn’t ever truly understand who you are.

Speegle described it as a very personal choice and claimed that he changed his lawful name and identity marker last year to reflect his gender identity.

“It’s never intended for anyone else. It was for me,” Speegle declared. “It wasn’t done for the state, the government, or the purpose of making a point. For myself, that is.”

However, FLHSMV Director of Communications Molly Best stated in a written declaration to WMFE News that the company requires adequate identification evidence, including biological sex, in order to be granted a driver’s license.

“You are not allowed to engage in identity elections with your driver’s license in Florida,” according to Best. “No modifications have been made to the procedure for determining sex on a recently issued Florida license, governed by s. 322.08, F.S.”

However, according to Robert Kynoch, Deputy Executive Director of FLHSMV, “misrepresenting one’s identity, understood as sex, on a driver’s license constitutes fraud and can result in criminal and civil penalties,” in his memo from January 26.

Best didn’t immediately respond to WMFE when asked what the shift meant for Floridians who had already changed the gender marker on their driver’s license in accordance with the previous guidance, simply stating that legal authority did not support it.

Florida lawmakers are currently debating a House proposal (HB 1639) that would codify the most recent agency memo by mandating that licenses reflect the person’s sex on the basis of “naturally occurring sexual hormones, internal and external genitalia present at birth.”

The most recent FLHSMV letter is the latest in a series of issues on LGBTQ+ individuals in Florida, according to Mulan Williams, who will be taking part in Orlando’s die-out on Friday.

Williams claimed that she founded Divas in Dialogue a number of years ago in an effort to assist younger generations in avoiding the same difficulties she did during her own transition.

“The lesbian community and the trans area, we’ve come a long way. However, there have been so many assaults on us recently,” Williams said. “It’s unfair, we’re not going to stand for it, and we won’t allow it to happen. Simply put, we are not.”