The Pentagon has issued new guidelines that will require the military to begin the discharge process for “transgender” service members.
“Military service by Service members and applicants for military service who have a current diagnosis or history of, or exhibit symptoms consistent with, gender dysphoria is incompatible with military service,” the Pentagon said in a February 26 memo.
“Service by these individuals is not in the best interests of the Military Services and is not clearly consistent with the interests of national security.”
“Individuals who have a current diagnosis or history of, or exhibit symptoms consistent with, gender dysphoria are no longer eligible for military service,” the memo continued, adding that a waiver could be considered on a case-by-case basis.
A waiver could be granted if there is a “compelling Government interest in accessing the applicant that directly supports warfighting capabilities. The applicant must be willing and able to adhere to all applicable standards, including the standards associated with the applicant’s sex.”
“The Department only recognizes two sexes: male and female. An individual’s sex is immutable, unchanging during a person’s life. All Service members will only serve in accordance with their sex,” per the memo.
The policy requires that all members must adhere to standards regarding “gendered facilities” (such as bathrooms, locker rooms, uniform requirements, and other military protocols based on biological sex). Pronoun usage must also reflect the service member’s biological sex.
The guidelines mandate the Pentagon to create a procedure to identify troops who are “transgender” within 30 days. Following that, the Department of Defense has another 30 days to begin discharging “transgender” persons from the military.
“Recently … the Armed Forces have been afflicted with radical gender ideology to appease activists unconcerned with the requirements of military service like physical and mental health, selflessness, and unit cohesion,” the Executive Order stated. “Consistent with the military mission and longstanding DoD policy, expressing a false ‘gender identity’ divergent from an individual’s sex cannot satisfy the rigorous standards necessary for military service.”
“Beyond the hormonal and surgical medical interventions involved, adoption of a gender identity inconsistent with an individual’s sex conflicts with a soldier’s commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in one’s personal life. A man’s assertion that he is a woman, and his requirement that others honor this falsehood, is not consistent with the humility and selflessness required of a service member.”
“For the sake of our Nation and the patriotic Americans who volunteer to serve it, military service must be reserved for those mentally and physically fit for duty,” the Executive Order continued.
Under Trump’s first administration, a similar ban was enacted in 2017 and upheld by the Supreme Court in 2019 before being reversed by former President Joe Biden in 2021.
Although exact figures on the number of “transgender” servicemembers are unavailable, the DoD previously quoted a RAND Corporation report in 2016 which estimated that roughly 2,500 to 7,000 of the 1.3 million active-duty servicemembers and 1,500 to 4,000 of the 825,000 reserve servicemembers were “transgender.”