Listen to this article

The former defense physicians said in a study that US President Donald Trump’s ban on many transgender people enlisting in the US military has harmed American forces. Recent restrictions on transgender recruitment were said to have harmed readiness and inflicted concrete harms on the military through lower recruitment levels and worse morale among personnel. 3 former military doctors and the Palm Center, an LGBTQ research institute wrote in the report that recruitment, reputation, retention, unit cohesion, morale, medical care, and good order & discipline had all been disrupted by the ban. The report’s conclusions sit in stark contrast with the Trump administration’s argument for the ban, which came into effect last April. Trump first suggested 3 years ago that he would reverse an Obama administration policy allowing transgender Americans to serve openly.

President Trump also claimed at the time that the ban would improve military readiness because transgender personnel was a disruption. The study also said, “Contrary to claims by the president and the Pentagon that allowing transgender service would be disruptive and costly, the ban itself has harmed readiness”. Restricting the military’s recruitment pool with some 200,000 Americans believed to be transgender. The restrictions were also reported to have undermined cohesion within military ranks and permitted attacks on LGBTQ service members. The report said, “The ban’s overriding message was that transgender people don’t belong in uniform could be used to drive such service members out”. Point to be noted that Pentagon data shows there are around 15,000 transgender service members in the US military.

It is noteworthy that those who came out prior to the Trump administration ban allowed to continue serving as long as they did so under the sex they were assigned at birth or obtained a waiver. The Pentagon insisted the restrictions on new recruitment were not a ban because of those exceptions. Some of Trump’s policies could come to an end under Joe Biden’s presidency. The legal director for the National Center for Lesbian Rights, Shannon Minter informed Bloomberg that she hoped and expected it will be one of the first things he does after he entered the White House. She said, “It wouldn’t require a lot of work because the prior policy is of course still in place for the transgender service members who had already transitioned and came out”.