President Donald Trump announced on Twitter on Wednesday morning that the U.S. military will not allow transgender individuals to serve “in any capacity,” reversing an Obama-era policy and sparking an outcry from Democratic lawmakers.
“After consultation with my Generals and military experts, please be advised that the United States Government will not accept or allow Transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the U.S. Military,” Trump wrote online, breaking his message up into multiple posts. “Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail. Thank you.”
Under President Barack Obama, former Defense Secretary Ash Carter laid out a plan to shift Pentagon policy to allow transgender troops to serve openly. Last month, Defense Secretary James Mattis announced that the Pentagon would delay his predecessor’s order for six months in order to review the impact of the shift.
A Trump administration official said that the president’s decision to announce the military’s transgender policy shift was at least in part motivated by conservatives who had opposed government spending legislation that might put money towards transgender health services.
The official said White House chief strategist Steve Bannon played a role in pushing Trump to move ahead with the new policy, despite the ongoing Pentagon review.
A Republican lawmaker who asked not to be named said Mattis had essentially removed himself from the transgender debate, preferring instead to focus on getting Pentagon appointees confirmed. “He already had one hot potato in his hands and he didn’t want another,” the lawmaker said.
Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, said on Monday that Mattis is on “personal travel,” this week, but said he would be “plugging in to several meetings back here remotely.”
When Carter first announced in June of last year that the military would allow transgender individuals to serve openly, he declared that “Americans who want to serve and can meet our standards should be afforded the opportunity to compete to do so.” Carter cited RAND Corporation research showing that roughly 4,000 transgender individuals were serving in the military as either active duty service members or reservists at the time and that there would be “minimal readiness impacts from allowing transgender service members to serve openly.”
The RAND report also estimated that the policy shift toward openness would cost between $2.4 million and $8.4 million a year, less than a 1 percent increase in annual active-duty health care spending.
In announcing a delay of the new transgender policy’s full implementation, a Pentagon spokeswoman said last month that the Department of Defense’s extended review would study the shift’s effect on “the readiness and lethality of our forces.” Trump’s Tuesday policy announcement, perhaps the biggest he has made via Twitter, seemed unusual given the Pentagon’s recent announcement of a six-month extension of a review period.
It was not immediately clear what impact, if any, Trump’s announcement would have on transgender members of the military currently serving openly. Carter’s announcement last summer allowed transgender troops to begin serving openly immediately without fear of medical discharge or being otherwise separated from the military because of their gender identity. Carter’s order put a 12-month delay on new transgender recruits joining the military, a review period that the Pentagon extended last month through the end of the year.
The move drew immediate criticism from Democrats, including Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), a frequent foe of Trump in his role as the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee. Schiff wrote on Twitter that the president’s “anti-trans pronouncement is ugly and wrong. Discrimination isn’t patriotic — allowing all who love this country to serve, is.”
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), also on Twitter, wrote that “transgender Americans are serving honorably in our military. We stand with these patriots.” His colleague Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, wrote online that “thousands of transgender service members defend our country. They’re patriots & should be applauded not discriminated against by Pres Trump.”
Trump’s announcement is the most recent in a string of moves that opponents have said curtail the rights of transgender individuals. Last February, Trump rescinded protections instituted by former President Barack Obama that allowed transgender students to use the bathrooms and locker rooms at their schools that corresponds with their gender identity.
The announcement also comes during what the White House has dubbed “American heroes week.”
The moves seemingly contradict a campaign promise Trump made last June, also on Twitter, where he wrote “thank you to the LGBT community! I will fight for you while Hillary [Clinton] brings in more people that will threaten your freedoms and beliefs.”
The president’s more open stance on transgender issues during the campaign helped, at least in part, to earn him the support of perhaps the most well-known transgender celebrity, Caitlyn Jenner, who has said she voted for the president last November and delivered a speech at an event that coincided with the Republican National Convention in Cleveland.
In an interview last summer with NBC’s “Today” show, Trump said that “there have been very few complaints” about a system in which individuals “use the bathroom that they feel is appropriate.” He said in the same interview that Jenner could use whatever bathroom she wanted inside Trump Tower, an offer the celebrity took him up on a week later in a video posted to Facebook.
Josh Dawsey, Eliana Johnson, Jacqueline Klimas, Rachael Bade and Connor O’Brien contributed to this report.
