Laverne Cox attends the Lifelong Pride Gala at Seattle’s Sanctuary on June 13, 2026. Mat Hayward/Getty Images for Lifelong President Donald Trump’s administration has made it a mission to roll back diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives across the federal government, and those efforts have had a trickle-down effect across corporate America. So much so that it’s cost Laverne Cox approximately 90 percent of her income over the last few years.
Cox, a high-profile transgender star who rose to fame thanks to an Emmy-nominated turn on Orange Is the New Black, made the reveal in a new interview with The Guardian while promoting her first book, a memoir titled Transcendent.
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“This regime has threatened to defund any colleges and universities that promote gender ideology, DEI,” she said, adding that she’s even lost teaching opportunities. “Even though I’d be teaching a graduate acting class, it could be perceived as promoting trans ideology. These are the realities. I’m not complaining — I’m very blessed. The important thing to note is that if Laverne Cox’s income has gone down significantly, what about all the other trans people who are not as privileged and as blessed as I am? There are material consequences for this kind of discrimination and scapegoating.”
The interview echoes earlier statements she made to Attitude. “I’ve lost so much money because of this administration, the past year,” Cox told the publication. “I managed to stay busy with acting and branding work, as well as speaking engagements. But I never thought college speaking gigs would dry up.”
Because of the impact on her bank account, Cox said she’s been forced to dip into reserves to stay afloat. “The past year or two, I’ve had to dip into savings and my retirement fund. So, the blessing is that I finally have the privilege to have a retirement fund to dip into, but you don’t really want to do that. If it’s affecting me, then it’s definitely affecting other people.”
And not just financially.
“If we don’t wake up and don’t understand, trans people will be exterminated,” she also told The Guardian. “People’s rights are being taken away, people are losing their jobs, people are losing healthcare, people are being de-transitioned in prison, gender-affirming care is being attacked, not just for children but also for adults. It’s never been about protecting women — it’s always been about creating a permission structure to scapegoat trans people, to dehumanise trans people, to take away our rights and to eliminate us from public life.”
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