On Monday, President Donald Trump issued four executive orders related to the military, one of which prohibits transgender individuals from openly joining and serving and another of which focuses on efforts to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion in the military.
“Prioritizing Military Excellence and Readiness,” the order addressing transgender military service, rescinds an order issued by then-President Joe Bident that permitted transgender service members to enlist and to receive coverage for transition-related medical care, and it reinstates a policy from Trump’s first term.
“It is the policy of the United States Government to establish high standards for troop readiness, lethality, cohesion, honesty, humility, uniformity, and integrity,” the directive reads. “The limitations placed on people with gender dysphoria by medical, surgical, and mental health conditions are incompatible with this policy. Additionally, the use of pronouns that incorrectly reflect a person’s sex or shifting pronoun usage are incompatible with this policy.
The directive requires the Defense Department to “end invented and identification-based pronoun usage” immediately, alter its military medical standards within 60 days, and forbid individuals assigned male at birth from using women’s restrooms for sleeping, changing, and bathing.
Transgender military members will not be immediately dismissed because the directive will take time to implement. The future of service members receiving transition-related care under the military’s health care program, Tricare, is uncertain. The care was already illegal since Biden signed a defense measure in December that forbade coverage of gender-affirming care for transgender children of service members.
Transgender service members were classified as either exempt or nonexempt under the Trump administration’s 2017 trans military restriction. Exempt service members came out as trans before the restriction and were permitted to continue serving openly and receive transition-related medical care, while nonexempt service members had to continue serving as their assigned sex at birth and were only eligible for therapy and other transition-related care covered by Tricare. Additionally, openly transgender individuals were not allowed to enlist under that policy.
Because it let service members to request a waiver, the administration at the time insisted that the policy was not a trans military ban, as it was commonly known. However, just one waiver was made public during the four years it was in force.
According to the White House paper regarding Trump’s new trans military directive, “it can take a minimum of 12 months for an individual to complete treatments after so-called transition surgery, which often involves the use of heavy narcotics.” They still need regular medical care and are not physically able to achieve military readiness requirements at this time. Deployment and other readiness criteria are not supported by this.
According to the document, the Department of Defense was ordered to pay for service members’ transition surgeries and those of their dependent children at a cost of millions of dollars to the American taxpayer after Biden overturned Trump’s previous ban on transgender individuals serving in the military.
The number of transgender people serving in the military is not officially disclosed by the Department of Defense, and estimates vary greatly. According to a 2014 study by the UCLA Williams Institute, which used data from the 2011 National Transgender Discrimination Survey, there were around 15,500 transgender individuals serving in the armed forces. According to a 2016 Rand Corp. report, which drew on Department of Defense data and earlier studies (such as the Williams Institute report), there were up to 10,790 transgender individuals serving in the armed forces and reserves, however the number could be as low as 2,150.
According to a report released this month by the Congressional Research Service, the Defense Department spent almost $15 million on transition-related care (including nonsurgical and surgical) for 1,892 active duty service personnel between 2016 and 2021. According to Military.com, which cited Defense Department data, $11.5 million of that sum was allocated to psychotherapy and $3.1 million to surgery.
Emily Shilling, a Navy commander who has been in the service since 2005, is the president of the transgender military advocacy organization SPARTA. Shortly after Trump’s initial trans military limits went into effect, Shilling came out as a transgender woman in April 2019. She was obliged to continue serving in a manner consistent with her biological sex. She claimed that she was allowed to come out at work after Biden eliminated the limitations in 2021.
Shilling stated that she and other trans service members simply want to continue serving when questioned about Trump’s new order limiting trans military duty. She made it clear that she was not speaking for the Navy or the Pentagon.
She continued, “As a fighter pilot and leader, I want to continue using the skills this country invested in me.” I’ve served with distinction since coming out as transgender in 2019, and I was promoted to the position of senior officer in my community. Serving my country has been the greatest honor of my life because it has given me so much.
Another order that Trump signed on Monday, called “Restoring America’s Fighting Force,” forbids diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives in the military. It also calls for the secretaries of the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security to review the curricula of the United States service academies to “ensure alignment” with the order, disbanding any DEI offices within those departments.
No more DEI at @DeptofDefense and No exceptions, name-changes, or delays, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth stated in a post that was shared on X on Sunday. A picture of a handwritten notice that read, “Those who do not comply will no longer work here,” was included in the post.
In the early days of his second term, Trump has made limiting diversity measures and reversing transgender rights efforts from the Biden administration his primary priority. He signed scores of executive orders within hours of his inauguration, one of which ended DEI programs within federal agencies and another stating that only two sexes—male and female—will be recognized by the U.S. government. The State Department suspended all passport applications demanding sex-marker alterations last week due to the gender-related regulation.