The Presidio Trust has directed employees to remove their gender pronouns from their email signatures, according to an internal email viewed by Gazetteer SF.
In a memo sent to employees Monday, Presidio Trust COO Diana Simmons instructed employees to remove their pronouns in email signatures by the end of the day. The note from Simmons mirrors a similar demand made to multiple federal agencies and comes as the Presidio Trust grapples with ongoing pressure from the Trump administration.
Last week, Trump issued an executive order calling for the Presidio Trust’s “non-statutory components and functions” to be eliminated after deeming them “unnecessary.” That’s all despite the Presidio Trust, which oversees and manages the Presidio and all its properties, being a financially self-sufficient entity lauded as a “gem of government efficiency.”
In the memo sent on Monday, Simmons said the Presidio Trust is “examining how to treat all people with dignity and respect consistent with our mission, as well as with the recent Executive Orders on DEI.”
While the Presidio Trust is still reviewing its internal practices, Simmons said, the federal agency has made two key decisions. The first is to remove “some content from our website immediately pending additional review”; the second is the requirement for employees to remove pronouns from their email signatures. It’s unclear, however, what content will be removed from the Trust’s website.
“We expect to share additional updates next week as [we] continue our review,” she wrote.
Presidio Trust spokesperson Lisa Petrie would not comment on the memo, but shared a previously-released media statement from last week. That statement said that all of the Presidio's services and businesses will "continue to operate as normal, welcoming visitors and serving all who live and work here," adding that the Trust plans to report back to the Office of Management and Budget, as required by the order, by the March 5 deadline.
Work for the Presidio Trust? You can contact the reporter at megan@gazetteer.co or securely via Signal at 415-516-5243.
