Female inmates say they fear transgender cellmates and urge Donald Trump to overturn 'unconstitutional policy'

Female federal prisoners are pinning their hopes on Donald Trump to get them away from 'sex pests' who identify as women to get into their cellblocks and assault them.

This is despite one inmate who attempted to get the law changed, losing a landmark case this week when a judge ruled that it's okay to lock people up according to their gender identity.

Rhonda Fleming, 58, who is a little more than halfway through a 27-year sentence for Medicare fraud, argues that she and other biological women live in constant fear of attack and stress over having to interact with and undress in front of inmates with male genitalia.

Fleming's civil suit stated women shouldn't be forced to share intimate spaces such as bathrooms, showers and dorms with trans women.

But the judge on the case didn't agree, ruling against her complaint on Wednesday. 

Fleming was outraged when she spoke to DailyMail.com and said: 'What the judge did Wednesday was a farce, it was a mockery of justice. He never intended for us to have a fair trial. 

'It's like he's attacking the victim, telling the victim you're in the wrong, not the victimizer.'

The inmate is hoping that Trump will change the Bureau of Prisons policy after he moves into the White House on Monday - and possibly appeal her case. 

'Trump tried to help in 2018 by changing the policy when I initially filed on this, but as soon as he was out of office, Biden overturned everything he did and brought even more men into the prison,' she said.  

Her lawyer Jeff Bristol told DailyMail.com: 'The best is to have our opinion rendered moot with the Trump administration repealing the policy and making a new one that protects the rights of women inmates.'

The incoming administration has already signaled that it is open to fixing the problem - calling former prisoner and policy change advocate Jeanette Driever for a meeting.

'They're going to bring awareness to what's happening in women's prisons and hopefully change some laws,' Driever, 47, who also served time with Fleming, told DailyMail.com.

'Someone from the Trump team emailed me back saying they will be calling me.' 

Fleming is currently serving time at Carswell Federal Medical Center in Fort Worth, Texas. She has been pursuing similar litigation against the Bureau of Prisons since 2016.

But her latest case, heard in Tallahassee, Florida, was the first time she has made it to trial.

On Tuesday, Fleming testified that the problem is only getting worse. Shuffled between four prisons in the past year, she said she's witnessed a recent surge of trans women entering the facilities.

Fleming claimed the Biden administration has been speeding up transfers out of concern Trump will make restrictions once he takes office.

The incoming president shot down an Obama-era guideline that recommended 'housing by gender identity when appropriate,' instead emphasizing 'biological sex as the initial determination for designation,' during his first term in 2018.

Joe Biden later reversed Trump's action.

Fleming claims there are between 1,500 and 2,000 trans female inmates in the federal prison system, which houses around 10,000 women.

In court papers, she claimed there was no way to shield herself in open dorms at the prison in Tallahassee, Florida, where she served part of her term.

That is the prison where Jeffrey Epstein's madam Ghislaine Maxwell is currently incarcerated.

The lawsuit alleged that Fleming and other inmates are forced to shower and use other facilities with 'known bisexual male inmates,' and that 'the plaintiff and other women in federal prisons have been threatened, bullied, sexually harassed and (faced) other misconduct by male inmates, many of whom have a history of attacking women and/or violent crime'.

Meanwhile, Fleming claimed that prison officials engage in 'forced indoctrination' by requiring inmates to use female pronouns when addressing or referring to biological males.

Bristol and co-counsel Diego Pestana argued that the Federal Bureau of Prisons Transgender Offender Manual – created in 2012 under Obama and expanded in 2022 under Biden – lays out specific rights and safeguards for transgender inmates, but that biological women don't get the same consideration.

'All we wanted was for the judge to issue an injunction that said natural born women get the same rights as trans inmates,' Bristol told DailyMail.com.

The U.S. Attorney's Office, in court filings, argued that Fleming 'refuses to even recognize the term 'transgender' exists, but that her beliefs don't give rise to a violation of the Constitution.'

They argued that the prison system 'cannot – and will not – risk the safety of transgender individuals, or subject itself to increased litigation, because (Fleming) does not like being housed with someone she views as different than her…'

The government added that 'all BOP facilities contain multiple privacy protections,' citing examples such as shower curtains and toilet partitions, and that Fleming admitted that in 16 years in prison, no one has ever seen her getting dressed.

The BOP also stated that the Tallahassee handbook requires inmates to be 'dressed at all times … in all areas of the housing unit.'

But Fleming argued that the shower curtains are so filthy that inmates often leave them open to avoid contact.

 In court, she spoke of seeing biological males so clearly during strip searches that she could describe their genitalia.

Her lawyers had hoped that a victory in the case could set an important precedent.

But after closing arguments on Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Mark Walker ruled against Fleming from the bench, arguing that she suffered no violations of her constitutional rights to bodily privacy and that prisons already have rules to protect her safety.

Fleming decried the ruling during an interview with DailyMail.com on Friday.

'We need an appellate court decision that states men should not be in women's prisons,' she said.

'JD Vance and President Trump support my position 100 percent, but we still need a court decision,' she added. 'This is bigger than prison. This is about women in intimate spaces, may it be in a dressing room in a department store or a restaurant bathroom.

'Men should not be in these intimate spaces.'

In a recent interview with The Free Press, Fleming depicted transgender inmates as mostly fakers, entering women's prisons with long hair and makeup before they 'start letting their beards and their mustache grow out, they get a haircut like a man and they're walking around like a guy.'

She told the publication that she, like fellow inmates, rush when they use the bathroom or shower out of fear, and see the transgender men exerting their dominance in the mess hall where they 'just walk in front of you, sometimes aggressively shoulder-checking you.'

Women's prison reform activist Amie Ichikawa, who attended Fleming's trial, told DailyMail.com she has seen at least 100 individual cases of transgender inmates targeting female prisoners since she started her organization, Woman II Woman.

'I'm disappointed but not surprised,' Ichikawa said of the judge's ruling. 

'It was apparent that the judge and the court does not acknowledge that incarcerated women are experiencing a violation of any of their limited rights by being forcibly housed with biological men.'

'There are men with d****s in women's prisons that are allowed to have rights that nobody else has in prison, which creates a dangerous privileged group because they are able to wield their power over other inmates.

She's now putting her faith in the Trump administration to reverse the liberal policy.

'The likelihood of there being a change with the transition – no pun intended – is much greater than under the Biden administration,' she said.