Following Northwestern’s Nov. 28 agreement with the Trump administration to restore at least $790 million in federal funding, NU claimed that “no restrictions” had been placed on its transgender community.
But students worry that provisions included in the deal are set to exclude trans, nonbinary and intersex students across a myriad of programs and facilities, an act that could violate Illinois law, according to civil rights attorney and Harvard Law School professor Alejandra Caraballo.
“Why would you accept trans people into your f—ing school if you’re not going to take care of them?” said Communication sophomore Angel Napp-Cáceres, a trans woman.
In the deal, NU agreed to define individuals by their sex “at conception” in line with Executive Order 14168, which President Donald Trump signed in January.
Chinese literature Prof. Paola Zamperini, director of the Gender and Sexuality Studies program, wrote in a statement to The Daily that “as experts in the study of gender and sex,” GSS leadership “does not concur with or condone the definition of gender” used in the executive order and agreement.
“The central claim — that gender is indistinguishable from biological sex, that both are immutable, and that existing beyond a cisgendered identity is impossible or immoral — is both cruel and demonstrably baseless,” she wrote on behalf of the faculty advisory board.
Zamperini further rejected the idea that related policies “are meant to ‘defend’ women,” referring to the executive order’s title, “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.”
The definition sharply breaks from those previously used by the University. In 2018, for example, when the first Trump administration considered establishing gender as immutable and equivalent to sex assigned at birth, NU called its commitment to gender-affirming policies “unshakable” and “ironclad.”
“If we continue down this road of being overly cautious about what the government is saying and allowing the government to define sex as immutable biological classifications … or implicitly condoning that rhetoric, I am curious to see if that will then place more implicit restrictions on the community,” Medill senior Juliet Allan said.
Under the executive order’s nomenclature, which explicitly excludes trans and nonbinary students and does not recognize intersex students, the University promised to offer “single-sex” housing upon request to students whose assigned sex is female.
The clause was of particular concern to Napp-Cáceres, who said she knows “so many people” that appear to be affected.
“Whatever is happening here in terms of accommodations, whatever is happening here in terms of people just being able to live the way that they want … is just being thrown away,” she said.
The University did not say how it intended to implement such housing. But three current and former executives of Hobart House, the only non-special interest residence on campus that exclusively allows non-men, said they felt the clause was pointed toward the residential college and feared NU could force out trans and nonbinary Hobartians.
Nonbinary students have explicitly been allowed at the residential college since executives updated its constitution, and trans women had already been permitted for years prior. But the decision to allow certain students ultimately falls back to Residential Services, the executives said.
“You’re not officially in our system until you register with Res Services,” said one current executive, who asked to be anonymous for fear of retribution from the University. “I very much see a way that the University could say, ‘We block this person from registering.’ We wouldn’t be able to do anything about that.”
Hobart’s “community values,” which have championed inclusivity in recent years, conflict with those the agreement expresses, she added.
Residential Services has continually supported Hobart’s wish to determine eligible residents by gender prior to the agreement, she said. Still, two former executives seconded her worry that the University could force students to be selected by sex assigned at birth.
“My initial gut reaction was disappointed but not surprised, which very quickly turned into genuine anger,” said one former executive, who also asked to be anonymous for fear of retribution from the University.
The University did not respond to multiple requests for comment asking how the agreement would affect Hobart.
A joint statement posted on Instagram on Dec. 6 by Rainbow Alliance and the Society of Trans and Nonbinary Students, two queer affinity organizations on campus, also expressed frustration with the housing clause.
The University has repeatedly promised to reform all-gender housing to better fit the needs of trans students, they wrote in the statement, at one point promising to establish “LGBTQ+ affinity housing.” But such promises have fizzled “to silence,” they said.
“Students should not have to face harassment in their dorms or couch-surf during breaks simply because the university will not offer safe all-gender housing,” they wrote.
NU also pledged in the agreement to provide sports teams, locker rooms and showers categorized on the basis of assigned sex, and said that it had revised some staff training modules to comply with a July Justice Department memo that advocated for similar policies, including barring trans women from women’s bathrooms and sports.
Caraballo said the provisions could violate the Illinois Human Rights Act, a 1979 state law protecting individuals in Illinois from more than 20 types of discrimination, including gender identity. The law has since been mirrored in corresponding Cook County and Evanston ordinances.
Sports programs, locker rooms and showering facilities are “public accommodations,” Caraballo said, a private entity defined under the law to include places of education.
“Those are governed by gender identity under the human rights law, and the school is potentially liable there,” Caraballo said.
The Illinois Department of Human Rights wrote in 2021 guidance that students “must be permitted” to freely access such facilities aligning with their gender identity, per the act.
A second former Hobart executive, who asked to be anonymous for fear of retribution from the University, expressed frustration with how NU framed the deal as a choice between its livelihood and having to “lose some battles.” The reality, she said, was that it “chose money over state law.”
Due to a severability clause in the agreement, some of the provisions could be ruled invalid if a court found them unlawful, Caraballo said. Still, even bringing a valid discrimination charge could prove difficult for such an “excessively lawyered” agreement, she said.
“The issue is you have to find someone that has (legal) standing here, that actively has harm and is actively being discriminated against,” she said.
In a separate provision of the deal, NU pledged to not “perform transgender surgeries” or provide hormone therapy to minors, though the extent to which the University offered such care is unclear.
The University wrote on the Office of the President website that it had “never performed gender-affirming surgeries for minors” but did not mention hormone therapy.
Rainbow Alliance and STANS said in their statement that Northwestern Medicine, an NU joint venture which operates the Student Health Service, stopped offering gender-affirming care to patients under 19 years old at least three months ago. Unaffiliated institutions, including Howard Brown Health in Chicago, continue to offer such care, they said.
Two first-year trans patients who were then 18 years old reported being denied gender-affirming care by NM as early as September, aligning with Rainbow Alliance and STANS’ statement.
In a letter received by one of the patients and shared with The Daily, NM said it stopped offering the care to those under 19 years old in line with Executive Order 14187, also signed by Trump in January.
Lurie Children’s Hospital, an independent teaching hospital affiliated with the Feinberg School of Medicine, said in a February statement that it had stopped offering gender-affirming surgeries to patients under 19, though it’s unclear whether the hospital still offers hormone therapy or if it would be affected by the agreement.
Caraballo said a wider interpretation of what it means to “perform” gender-affirming care could potentially widen standing for a lawsuit to invoke the severability clause.
“Employees of Northwestern have health insurance that covers care for trans youth,” she said. “It remains to be seen whether or not Northwestern is going to maintain that coverage in their policies, and if they drop those provisions of coverage, that could then potentially give room to challenge it.”
In response to questions sent by The Daily, the University wrote Tuesday that it updated the Office of the President website to clarify that the agreement “does not impact employee health insurance coverage.”
The University also stated it added an additional paragraph clarifying that private changing rooms and showers will be available to “any woman who seeks a single-sex option.” It did not indicate, however, how it would make such facilities available.
Right now, the future for trans students at NU feels uncertain, Napp-Cáceres said.
“My identity is awareness, my love is a support network and my community will thrive because I f—ing say so,” she read from a statement she planned to post on social media. “I will not back down, and I hope everybody who does have the privilege will too.”
Yana Johnson contributed reporting.
Email: [email protected]
Bluesky: @ryaninevanston.bsky.social
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