Ajana Orozco is like a lot of people.

She's a recent college grad.

She went to UCLA.

She's working a gig job to make ends meet while she studies up for her dream job, which is to become a lawyer.

Ajana also happens to be trans.

And she was working at Lyft and then Uber trying to make more money.

But when she tried to drive for Uber, she got lost in customer support Limbo.

My photo was rejected, and I contacted them and asked them, why was my photo rejected?

And they're like, oh, because it doesn't match your driver's license photo.

And I was like, okay, I get that, but that's me.

I'm Gustavo Arayano.

You're listening to The Times, Daily News from the LA Times.

It's Tuesday, February 22nd, 2022.

Uber's under fire for its treatment of transgender drivers like Ajana after the LA Times published a story about the legendist treatment.

Today, we'll hear from my colleague who broke the story, and we'll also hear more from Ajana, who hopes other Uber drivers won't ever have to go through what she went through.

Thank you. Suhanna Hussein is a business reporter for the LA Times. Suhanna, welcome to the Times.

Hey, thanks for having me.

So you started hearing stories from transgender drivers about their experiences with Uber.

What did they tell you?

I talked to several trans drivers who had this issue where their accounts were put on hold because

their documents were marked as fraudulent by the company.

I get it. Like my picture doesn't match what I look like today, but then I'm thinking, well,

...