The EU’s highest court has ruled that member states cannot refuse to update the gender data of trans citizens who have exercised their right to free movement, in a landmark judgment with implications for trans people across the bloc.
The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) handed down the ruling on 12 March in the case of a Bulgarian trans woman, known in court documents as K.M.H., who has lived in Italy for nearly a decade. Despite having undergone social and medical transition, Bulgarian authorities repeatedly refused to update her name and gender markers on official documents. The mismatch left her facing daily barriers: accessing healthcare, renting a home, securing employment, even paying by card.
Bulgaria is one of three EU member states that have made any access to legal gender recognition impossible, the others being Hungary and Slovakia. In 2023, Bulgaria’s Supreme Court issued a binding decision declaring that national law offered no procedure for courts to approve changes to gender markers in civil registry documents. The CJEU found that ban incompatible with EU law.
The court ruled that EU law “must be interpreted as precluding legislation of a member state which does not permit the amendment of gender data… of a national of that member state who has exercised his or her right to move and reside freely in another member state.” It also said national courts cannot treat domestic constitutional rulings as binding where they conflict with EU law, effectively overriding both Bulgaria’s Supreme Court precedent and its Constitutional Court interpretation.
The CJEU stated unequivocally that access to legal gender recognition is necessary for the full enjoyment of EU citizenship, creating a new legal obligation for member states to provide functioning systems for nationals who have moved abroad. Scene Magazine Member states must also have, in the court’s own words, “clear, accessible and effective procedures” for gender recognition to ensure those rights can actually be used.
Rights organisations welcomed the ruling while noting its limits. Denitsa Lyubenova, a lawyer at LGBTI organisation Deystvie who represented the applicant, said all pending cases in Bulgaria must now be resumed without delay, but warned that Bulgarian citizens who have not exercised their right to free movement are still left without an effective legal pathway to change their personal data. ILGA-Europe
ILGA-Europe senior strategic litigation advisor Marie-Hélène Ludwig described the judgment as “a huge step forward,” adding that the European Commission now has a strong legal basis to act against states that do not comply. TGEU expert advisor Richard Köhler said thousands of trans people across the EU could “breathe a sigh of relief.”
The ruling does not apply to the UK, which is no longer part of the EU. Its timing is pointed. As the CJEU affirms that trans people have a fundamental right to legal recognition of their gender, the UK’s legal landscape is moving in the opposite direction following the Supreme Court’s ruling in FWS v Scottish Ministers, which defined “woman” in the Equality Act strictly by biological sex, and which has already prompted Girlguiding to ban trans girls from its groups. The European Parliament passed a resolution last month declaring that trans women are women. In Brussels and in London, the gap is widening.
