US to Effectively Ban Transgender Troops

Transgender troops will be booted from the military within 60 days, the Pentagon said in a memo issued Wednesday. The memo follows President Trump's executive order, signed late last month, stating the expression of "a false 'gender identity'" harms military readiness. Some active-duty troops sued in response, arguing the order violates the equal protection component of the Fifth Amendment, per NBC News. The memo—claiming the "high standards for service member readiness, lethality, cohesion, honesty, humility, uniformity, and integrity" is "inconsistent with the medical, surgical, and mental health constraints" of individuals with gender dysphoria—was made public as part of that case, per Reuters.

It says the Pentagon must identify service members with a diagnosis or symptoms of gender dysphoria within 30 days and discharge them within the following 30 days, per Reuters. Affected troops can apply for a waiver if "there is a compelling government interest in retaining the service member that directly supports warfighting capabilities." But they must show they never attempted to transition genders and demonstrate three years of "stability in the service member's sex without clinically significant distress." Even then, the military will evaluate applications on a case-by-case basis. If a waiver is granted, the service member would need to use the bathrooms and sleeping quarters of their biological sex, per the AP.

Trans advocates say it's an "unprecedented" step, per Reuters. Though Trump announced he'd ban transgender people from the military during his first term, he ultimately settled on freezing the recruitment of such troops. This "is a complete purge," says Shannon Minter of the National Center For Lesbian Rights, one of the groups behind the lawsuit. A recent Gallup poll found a majority of Americans believe openly transgender people should be allowed to serve in the military. There were an estimated 8,000 openly transgender troops on active duty as of 2020, per Axios. (More transgender stories.)