USCA11 Case: 18-13592 Document: 304-1 Date Filed: 12/30/2022 Page: 127 of 150
(concluding that the third factor supports the existence of a quasi-suspect class of transgender individuals).
Fourth and finally, we must determine whether transgender individuals are a minority class lacking in political power. The district court found that “0.6 percent of the adult population” is transgender. Doc. 192 at 7. Even when we take into account the small proportion of the population transgender individuals comprise, they are underrepresented in political and judicial office nationwide. See Grimm, 972 F.3d at 613 (observing that “[e]ven considering the low percentage of the population that is transgender, transgender persons are underrepresented in every branch of government”). Plus, as I noted in discussing the first quasi-suspect-class factor, the district court found that “there is a documented history of discrimination against transgender individuals.” Doc. 192 at n.15. In support, the district court cited Adams’s filing identifying numerous examples of governmental discrimination against transgender individuals—for example, a 2017 Presidential directive excluding transgender people from open service or accession in the United States armed forces and a North Carolina law that blocks local governments from passing anti-discrimination rules that grant protections to transgender individuals. No group with any political power would allow this type of purportedly legalized discrimination against it. See Grimm, 972 F.3d at 613 (“[E]xamples of discrimination cited under the first factor affirm what we intuitively know: Transgender people constitute a minority that has not yet been able to meaningfully vindicate their rights through the
