Attorney Hendrix Moise Continues Ten Year Tradition of Name-Change Clinics at Affirmations
(Chelsea Bossert, March 16, 2025)
Ferndale, MI. — On Jan. 17, 2025, Governor Gretchen Whitmer signed a flight of bills into law, two of which are HB 5300 and 5303. Those bills, according to a press release put out by the Governor, make it easier for all Michiganders to legally change their name.
In addition to streamlining the process, the Governor’s press release also states that, “this change also supports individuals changing their name as a result of domestic violence, stalking, human trafficking, or gender affirmation by creating a presumption of good cause to waive the previous publication requirement for these cases.”
Among those who support an efficient name-change process are Michigan’s transgender and non-binary communities.
According to Governor’s office, in 2023 there were “311,400 LGBTQ+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer) adults, 32,900 of whom identify as transgender.”
But how does one go about changing their name, whether they are transgender or not? What resources are there?
In 2015, Affirmations — a LGBTQIA+ community resource center in Ferndale — teamed up Equality MI and attorney Hendrix Moise to put on name change clinics or transgender and non-binary people looking to go through the process.
Oakland County Times spoke with Moise and how he got to this point in his career. He’s been doing this clinic on and off for about 10 years now and he’s urged people to do their research, especially with the current Presidential administration and Michigan’s most recent process updates.
“I just kind of became an expert in it, just kind of by accident, actually,” Moise said. “I worked with different organizations — like volunteering — throughout the 2010s and people would ask me how you do name changes, so eventually I just kind of learned how to do it.”
Affirmations offers this name change clinic, on zoom, every third Thursday of the month. This month it will be on Mar. 20. In these clinics, experts like Moise go over a powerpoint that takes the individual through the entire legal journey.
Moise has worked in law since the early 2010s. He graduated from Wayne State’s law program and eventually created their own practice – Moise Legal PLLC.
“When I graduated, there weren’t a lot of jobs — because of the recession,” Moise said. “It was terrible for legal students, so I kind of created my own job, and started working for myself.”
Moise has gone through the name change process himself, and through experiencing it firsthand, he has an increased understanding of the emotional implication of why trans people change their names.
“I think it’s one of the markers of transition,” Moise said. “Kind of being reborn almost, that’s how I look at it.”
Affirmation’s name change clinics are a great resource for those who want to get familiar with the process, even if they aren’t wanting to change their name themselves, or for those who are not changing them for gender-identity related reasons.
“Some people want to change their names because they don’t want to associate with their family anymore, some people change their name out of marriage or divorce, they want to change it back, there’s all kinds of reasons people change their names. But I find the trans name-changes the most powerful of all that I do,” Moise said.
The streamlining of name changes for gender affirmation reasons, as well as taking away a key barrier-to-entry for a lot of transgender and non-binary Michiganders — it’s a change that Moise is very happy about.
“I think this latest change is great,” Moise said. “Because it takes away publishing: not all trans people really want to publish their information. There was kind of a secret petition — that not everyone knew about — where you could waive the publication.”
Before the laws passed in the Michigan legislature were signed by Whitmer, if you wanted to change your name legally, you would have to have your new name be published by a newspaper in a notice.
You could also choose to ask the judge to waive the publication, the reason most often given for transgender individuals is that they would most likely face discrimination if their information was made public via publishing.
Moise’s legal practice does not just specialize in Michigan name change and queer law — he primarily practices as a criminal defense lawyer.
“I’m sure I’m gonna get a lot of calls now with the law change and I’ll just tell them all ‘you don’t wanna hire me: you can file that petition and you can get your court date. If you really want to hire me that’s fine too,’” Moise said. But the clinics at Affirmations are there as a way for Moise to give back to the community, and the reward is in helping others.
You can find information about Mchigan’s newest enacted name change laws at: michigan.gov/whitmer/news/press-releases/2025/01/17/governor-whitmer-signs-bills-supporting-technology-and-innovation.
More information about Affirmation’s name change clinics, as well as dates for future clinics can be found at: goaffirmations.org/name-gender-marker-change-clinics/.
