Despite everything Trump and his misadministration attempted to do to thwart it, one of the things that happened starting today is that transgender Americans who wish to do so can enlist in the US Armed Forces.
The Trump Administration decided on Friday they would no longer challenge the policy in court after taking losses last week in two different circuit courts which rejected their bid to put on hold orders from lower court federal judges requiring the Pentagon to admit transgender recruits starting today.
“Plaintiffs allege, and the Court agrees, the ban sends a damaging public message that transgender people are not fit to serve in the military,” U.S. District Judge Jesus Bernal said in his ruling. “There is nothing any court can do to remedy a government-sent message that some citizens are not worthy of the military uniform simply because of their gender. A few strokes of the legal quill may easily alter the law, but the stigma of being seen as less-than is not so easily erased.”
That makes six federal courts that have rejected the Trump Administration on this issue.
As you probably guessed, the potential transgender recruit will have to clr a series of lengthy urdles before they can join the branch of our military they are applying for, but after dealing with a gender transition, those hurdles will probably seems like a cakewalk to that person.
The recruit must be certified by a medical provider they are clinically stable in their preferred gender for 18 months, and are free of significant distress or impairment in social, occupational or other areas.
Like advocates for open trans military service, I'm concerned that the Pentagon's guidelines, especially in the hands of a hostile political regime and people inside the military resistant to the enlistment of transgender recruits will result in little to zero trans people being allowed in to join the over 15,000 trans people already serving in our armed forces..
We in Trans America will be watching along with our allies to see if the Pentagon not only allows transgender recruits, but does so in a fair and impartial manner.
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