Washington, D.C. began offering gender-neutral driver's licenses Tuesday, becoming the first city in the country to do so.
The new licenses allow people who don't identify with a gender to mark their license with an X, instead of with "male" or "female."
It's a leap forward for people who have long battled others' effort to assign them a binary gender, said Jay Wu of the National Center for Transgender Equality.
Wu got the new license Tuesday.
"It's just going to help everyone come to a place where we respect everyone, regardless of their gender," Wu said.
There is no estimate of how many people may opt for the X, but District officials say they are alerting federal and state agencies nationwide that the license is legitimate.
"It's saying that we respect the rights of all individuals. And all individuals deserve the right to say who they are," said Lucinda Babers, director of the D.C. Department of Motor Vehicles.
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Starting July 3, Oregon will become the first state to offer the gender-neutral identifier.
Democratic Mayor Muriel Bowser has said the new ID cards are "the most recent example of our city's commitment to inclusivity."
