The woman, identified as Jane Doe in the lawsuit, updated her birth certificate in Illinois in June but was denied when she attempted to make the same change to her Tennessee driver’s license. DMV officials cited SB1440, a law signed by Gov. Bill Lee (R) in 2023 that requires state-issued identification documents to reflect a person’s sex assigned at birth rather than their gender identity.

“June 2026, [Doe] changed her Illinois birth certificate to reflect her sex,” reads the complaint, as reported by WVLT. “[Doe] attended the Knox County Department of Motor Vehicles to change her driver’s license… she was told due to [a Tennessee law] that she would be unable to have her driver’s license reflect her sex.”